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THE  ALPHA  OF  MONEY 


A  REPLY  TO  MR  CARNEGIE'S 
"A.  B.  C.  OF  MONEY." 


BY    GEORGE    EEED. 


"^4  question  is  never  settled  till  it  is  settled  right.'''' 

— B.  Disraeli 


^TJiriVBRSITT] 


COPYRIGHT,  1893,  P.Y  GEORGE  REED.     ALL  RIGHTS  RESERVED. 
STEUNENliER(i  I5ROS.,  PRINTERS,  CALDWELL,  IDAHO. 


4  THE  ALPHA   OF   MONEY. 

men  cringe  and  wince  at  your  behest,  glory  in  human  misery,  and  to 
that  end  may  take  advantage  of  the  law  that  comes  to  your  assistance; 
or,  it  may  be,  on  the  other  hand,  that  you  want  it  for  the  good  that  you 
can  do  in  the  world  with  it— for  the  happiness  that  you  can  bring  by 
means  of  it ;  or,  you  may  be  ambitious  and  desire  to  have  it,  and  this 
will  very  probably  be,  because  men  will  labor  for  it,  and  through  the 
toil  of  men,  you  may  obtain  all  the  material  blessings,  as  well  as  the 
pomps  and  vanities  of  this  world.  In  any  case  it  gives  prestige  and 
power,  and  is  an  extremely  desirable  possession.  We  will  not  explain 
why  men  toil  for  it,  nor  go  further  into  this  musing,  than  to  say  it  is 
often  a  means  of  storing  value,  and  this  value  after  all  but  lies  in  the 
fact  that  it  can  purchase  the  "sweat  of  the  brow,"  the  labor  of  the 
"brain,"  and  the  "brawn"  of  mankind,  or  the  produce  thereof.  That  it 
stores  value,  but  means  that  it  stores  labor  or  energy,  and  this  is  more  or 
less  in  a  given  amount  of  money  at  different  times  and  places  according 
to  circumstances  and  with  different  kinds  of  labor  be  it  mental,  or  mus- 
cular, or  both  in  unison,  in  varying  degree  as  is  generally  the  case.  It 
amounts,  after  all,  to  a  storage  of  human  blood,  but  this  blood  cannot  be 
measured  by  the  quart  at  a  set  price  for  there  are  great  differences  in  it 
and  it  varys  greatly  in  value. 

Before  going  further  1  will  state  that  the  word  money  is  very  loosely 
used  in  ordinary  conversation,  or  rather  it  has  many  meanings  not  ex- 
actly the  same.  ^Ve  say  "good  money,"  and  "bad  money,"  when  as  a  mat- 
ter of  fact  if  H  thing  is  money  at  all,  it  must  be  good  money;  and  if  it  is 
bad  money  it  mustbe  false  and  not  money  at  all.  To  say  that  a  man 
has  "made  money"  means  tliat  he  has  gained  the  equivalent  of  a  sum  of 
money.  A  dollar  gold  piece  and  a  twenty  dollar  piece  are  both  money 
without  distinction,  whereas  the  second  is  certainly  more  money  than 
tlie  first,  which  after  all  is  the  distinction.  To  give  a  man  money  may  be 
to  give  a  man  one  coin,  or  many  coins,  or  even  paper.  It  may  be  to  give 
him  money,  or  the  representative  of  money,  and  the  amount  may  be 
more,  or  less,  than  the  standard  of  value,  or  unit  of  value,  or  price  stand- 
ard. We  say  that  we  have  in  this  United  States  many  kinds  of  money: 
such  as  gold  money,  silver  money,  nickel  money,  copper  money,  paper 
money,  etc.  Whereas  we  have  only  one  money,  which  is  of  gold,  the  rest 
are  representative,  although  it  would  be  quite  possible  to  have  more  than 
one  money,  but  not  under  our  present  system. 

We  will  now  define  what  we  mean  by  money,  or  will  try  to  give  a 
definite  meaning  to  the  word  as  used  in  this  discussion;  however,  we  may 
use  the  word  in  different  senses  at  times,  but  this  is  the  sense  in  which 
we  are  arguing: 

MONEY  IS   TIIA.T  DEFINITE  TIIKfG   COMMONLY   USED  AS  A  STANDARD  OF 

PRICE. 

Thus  the  gold  dollar  is  the  money  of  the  United  States;  that  is,  the 
unit  of  value  according  to  law  and  therefore  arbitrarily  established;  the 
pound  sterling  is  the  money  of  England;  the  Mexican  dollar  is  the  money 
of  Mexico.  The  word  definite  will  apply  to  the  money  of  every  advanced 
people.  \\'here  metal  is  used  it  will  be  a  well  known  weight  of  the  same. 
If  it  be  oil  it  will  be  an  exact  measure.  If  it  be  tobacco  or  wheat  it  will 
be  a  definite  amount,  for  trade  will  not  deal  in  doubt  as  to  quantity.  If 
it  be  a  piece  of  cotton  cloth,  as  has  been  in  Africa  in  places,  there  will  be 
a  standard  length,  breadth  and  quality:  and  so  with  wampum,  etc.  In 
fact  it  will  amount  to  measured  merchandise.  Therefore  we  may  have 
Chinese  money,  English  money,  (German  money,  etc.  The  word  common- 
ly applies  to  a  community,  small  or  large,  and  it  may  embrace  part  of  a 
country  or  more  than  one  country.  Some  one  will  say  that  the  above  is  a 
good  definition  of  what  some  writers  call,  "money  of  account,"  and  so  it  is, 
but  the  phrase  "money  of  account"  is  often  used  as  if  to  intimate  that 
any  other  money  would  be  of  no  account.  Our  single  standard  gold 
writers  often  use  this  phrase  it  would  almost  seem  with  such  implication, 
but  the  truth  simply  is,  that  it  is  not  of  account  or  computation  when 
any  definite  quantity  of  gold  is  the  standard  by  which  all  other  things 
are  priced. 

The  same  could  be  said  of  gold  where  silver  money  is  the  price 
standard  or  unit  of  value,  A  money  therefore  under  any  true  and  log- 
ical idea  of  trade  is  merchandise,  and  moneys  therefore  are  merchandise, 
A  money  is  none  the  less  merchandise  because  it  happens  to  be  a  price 
standard,  notwithstanding  certain  Governments  have  taken  it  upon 


THE   ALPHA   OF   MONEY.  0 

themselves  to  arbitrarily  designate  certain  metals  and  command  that 
they  only  shall  be  used  as  tiie  raw  material  out  of  which  money  or  units 
of  value  or  standards  ot  value  or  price  units  shall  be  made.  ISome  of 
them  have  commanded  that  certain  amounts  of  a  certain  metal  shall  be 
used  as  money  and  have  even  prohibited  or  prevented  the  use  of  certain 
valuable  or  high  priced  metals  as  money  in  tlie  true  sense  at  all,  allowing 
them  only  to  be  minted  as  token  coins.  JPa^jer  money  under  the  abu\  e 
conception,  is  not,  niuney  at  all,  but  is  the  representative  of  money  and  is 
used  in  place  of  money  under  the  belief  that  money  could  be  goiten  for 
it  if  wanced,  or  that  it  is  as  "good  '  as  money.  It  stands  in  place  of  money 
like  an  -a"  or  an  "x"  stands  in  place  of  a  quantiiy  in  algebra. 

Paper  money  is  a  promise  to  pay,  or  a  contract  tor  the  delivery  of 
metallic  goods,  or  money  if  you  please,  or  it  is  an  order  on  some  one  for 
the  delivery  of  these  goods,  or  money  if  you  prefer,  just  as  you  might 
have  an  order  upon  a  w  areliouse  inau  for  soap,  sugar,  or  Hour.  This  may 
may  go  in  trade  in  place  ot  the  soap,  for  instance,  because  one  can  get 
the  suap  for  ii.  It  is  there  in  the  bank  ready  to  be  delivered  to  any  order 
or  properly  accredited  ptrrson,  but  as  a  matter  of  face,  it  is  just  as  reason- 
able to  talk  of  paper,  soap,  or  sugar  or  Hour,  as  to  talk  of  paper  money, 
even  though  uie  latter  does  serve  as  a  medium  of  excnange.  The 
promise  to  pay  money,  may  go  in  trade  on  the  same  principle,  although 
here  enters  tiie  element  of  doubt  as  to  ability  to  perlorm,  and  therefore 
some  unct^rtMinty,  greater  or  less,  according  to  reputation,  etc. 

This  is  the  paper  money  issued  ordinarily  by  (jiovernments.  Govern 
menis  can  not  in  iruth  make  money,  nor  create  any  thing,  though  custom 
brought  about  by  governmental  regulation  or  intervention,  may  have  a 
great  eilect  on  prices  or  the  commercial  values  of  commodities,  and 
Liiereby  arbitrarily  and  unjustly  affect  money  so  called  or  rather  com- 
merce. Coining  metals  is  not  making  money  in  ilie  true  sense,  it  is  or 
otiglit  to  be  simpiy  tlie  certifying  to  the  quantity  of  a  well  known  com- 
mouity.     it  is  maiving  coins. 

The  silver  dollar  of  the  United  States  under  our  present  system  is 
not  moi.ey.  it  is  but  the  representative  of  the  gold  dollar  and  is  but  a 
little  more  aristocratic  than  tne  nickel,  or  the  one  cent  piece,  as  they  are 
all  representative.  J  he  silver  dollar  is  not  anywhere  in  the  United 
htates  that  dehnite  thing  commonly  used  as  a  standard  of  price,  or  price 
standard,  it  is  only  representative  of  that  dehnite  thing.  Trade,  cus- 
toiii  and  use  make  money  and  should  be  allowed  to  operate  unimpeded 
by  arbitrary  intervention  or  direction. 

Tie  issuance  of  paper  money  by  Governments  is  not  making  money, 
it  is  making  debts,  anu  tht-y  arc  tlie  only  associations  in  the  world  that 
force  their  notes  upon  people  by  law;  and  it  is  an  tin  warrantable  priv- 
ilege only  defensible  in  wur  or  under  ilie  dire  necessity  of  self  defense  that 
knows  no  law  or  rather  must  obey  a  higher  law.  Much  the  same  may  be 
said  of  their  token  coins,  whicii  after  all  are  but  tradesinans'  tokens  like 
the  bits  of  brass  tliat  say  on  one  side,  '"good  for  V2,%  cents,"  and  "John 
Gough,"  on  the  otlier,  which  ought  not  to  be  forced  upon  any  one  but 
their  maker  and  pubhslier.  John  Gough.  In  the  case  of  the  silver  dollar, 
the  silver  in  the  token  itself  may  be  worth  say,  70  cents  in  gold,  while  the 
coin  goes  in  trade  lor  one  dollar  in  gold  because  the  Government  has 
promised  to  make  it  good  to  that  amount.  It  is  the  representative  of  a 
gold  dollar;  it  is  a  share  iii  a  stock  of  gold  somewhere,  and  its  great  office 
is  to  facilitate  the  circulation  of  gold,  increasing  thereby  its  use,  en- 
hancing its  price  and  placing  it  at  its  own  expense  at  an  artilicial  alti- 
titude  unwarranted  by  justice  and  true  commercial  welfare. 

lender  our  present  -parity"  system  with  a  gold  unit  of  value  or  ex- 
change, you  could  not  borrow  or  deal  in  silver  money  in  this  country 
even  if  you  should  wish  to. 

It  may  be  thought  from  what  has  been  said  that  the  author  altogeth- 
er condemns  the  use  of  paper,  credit,  or  representative  money,  or  rather 
representatives  of  money,  of  every  kind.  By  no  means;  let  us  have  as 
many  aids  to  comm'erce  as  possible.  The  more  tnide  can  be  facilitated 
the  better,  for  what  we  want  after  all  is  more  perfect  barter.  Let  com- 
merce have  as  many  aids,  as  much  paper,  and  many  clearing  houses  as 
her  needs  may  require:  but  let  her  be  tree.  Do  not  force  any  tiling  upon 
her  for  the  benefit  of  the  gold  trade,  the  silver  trade,  or  any  other  trade. 
Herein  lies  the  iniquity  of  letral  tender  laws  and  arbitrary  money  or  pro- 
tected "standards  of  value."  That  a  great  deal  of  the  "business  of  the 
world  is  done  through  credit  does  not  argue  for  the  gold,  the  silver  or 
any  other  standard.  ' 


6  THE   ALPHA   OF   MONEY. 

It  will  exist  under  any  and  all  circumstances  whether  gold,  silver,  or 
platinum  be  money.  The  clearing  house  or  transfer  of  credit  systems 
simply  facilitate  exchange,  and  make  barter  more  nearly  perfect. 
Debts  are  bui  contracts  tur  the  delivery  of  goods  and,  rightly  under- 
stood, are  p^iyabie  in  exactly  wnat  was  agreed  to  be  delivered,  be  ic  sil- 
ver, gold,  placinum,  sugar,  or  flour. 

if  we  out  thought  clearly  it  would  be  as  sensible  to  talk  of  a  debt- 
paying  bushel  of  wneat,  or  ton  of  coal,  as  to  talk  of  a  debt  paying  dollar. 
Uebts  are  but  obligations  for  the  performance  of  sometlung,  and,  in 
trcide,  are  contracts  for  payment  or  the  delivery  of  goods.  JN'o  law  should 
exist  that  makes  it  possible  to  contract  debts  in  money  only,  and  such 
debts  .should  be  legctlly  held  simply  as  contracts  for  the  delivery  of  such 
merchandise  and  not  more  sacred  than  contracts  for  the  delivery  of  any 
other  merchandise  or  commodities.  It  is  no  part  of  the  business  of  Con- 
gress, or  of  the  laws  to  stand  sponsor  to  value  or  prices.  They  need  not 
regulate  them,  that  is  the  business  or  ratlier  the  resultant  of  trade.  It 
would  be  well  to  declare,  as  an  axiom  of  government,  that  every  busi- 
ness must  take  it  own  risks.  'Jhe  business  of  government  is  protection, 
but  not  favoritism,  and  there  is  no  reason  why  the  gold  trade  or  the  sil- 
ver trade  should  be  protected  in  prices,  or  otlierwise,  any  more  than  tiie 
iron  trade,  or  the  wool  trade,  or  the  cotton  trade,  or  the  boot  traae,  or 
any  other  trade  should  be  protected  in  the  same  manner,  special  ag- 
griindizemetit,  when  brought  about  by  wrong,  is  not  progress  ;  and  no 
<.jOvernment  should  favor  robbery  direct,  or  indirect,  of  individuals, 
classes,  systems,  or  industries  for  the  beneht  of  any  other  individuals, 
classes,  systems,  or  industries.  "  The  king  can  do  no  wrong,  "  may  be  a 
good  enough  saying  for  Monarchists  ;  but  the  proud  sovereigns  of  a 
iiepublic  Should  say,  "•  A  (Government  shall  do  no  w^rong."  The  end  of 
Government  should  be  to  protect  men  in  their  rights,  not  to  uphold  power 
in  its  wrong.  A  people  should  be  as  careful  to  abolish  vested  wrongs  as 
it  is  to  protect  vested  rights  ;  and  wherever  Government  has  advanced, 
its  steps  have  been  taken  in  this  direction.  Legal  tender  laws  are  ac- 
cording to  these  views,  but  arbitrary  interference  with  the  rights  of 
man.  They  are  black  relics  of  barbarism  unworthy  of  these  modern 
days. 

Let  a  man  deliver  what  he  contracts  to  deliver  and  let  the  people 
trade  how  and  in  what  they  will.  This  legal  tender  idea  seems  to  be 
born  of  the  fancy  that  money  is  the  breath  of  life  blown  in  by  Govern- 
ment, and  the  sotil  and  essence  of  wealth,  trade,  happiness,  and  nobilty, 
that  should  be  protected  and  favored  far  away  above  its  otlier  humbie 
sisters  of  the  various  commodities. 

Moneys  ought  to  be  the  servants  of  trade,  and  are,  as  such,  great 
blessings  and  conveniences.  But  no  money  should  be  made,  by  legal 
intervention,  the  mistress  of  trade,  the  tyrant  of  commerce,  the  butcher 
of  industry  and  enterprise,  and  the  cruel  arbiter  of  the  destinies  of  na- 
tions and  of  men.  jNor  siiouki  money  have  rights  superior  to  other 
species  of  property.  Men  shotild  be  eqiially  protected  in  all  their  prop- 
erty rights. 

Legal  tender  laws  or  monetary  systems  are  indefensible  interven- 
tions in  trade.  They  are  despotic,  tyrannical,  illogical  and  pernicious. 
They  are  a  disadvantage  to  true  exchange  and  a  fraud  upon  indus- 
try and  labor.  They  are  one  of  the  most  outrageous  and  contemptible 
oppressions  ever  inHicted  by  arbitrary  power  upon  suffering  humanity, 
and  the  time  will  come,  long  before  the  advent  of  the  ^'ew  Zealander  on 
the  site  of  the  ruins  of  Loudon  bridge,  when  people  will  wonder  that 
they  ever  existed  as  much  as  they  do  now  over  the  ancient  laws  regard- 
ing witchcraft,  free  expression  of  opinion,  attainder,  mortmain,  etc.,  etc. 
Out  of  this  idea  of  "legal  tender"  or  the  right  of  government  to  tix 
values  or  rather  prices,  'regulate  money  or  the  currency,"  force  men  to 
take  one  thing  for  another,  etc.,  have  grown  the  illogical  system  of  the 
United  States,  or  so  cahed  Bi-metallic  system  and  the  single  gold  stand- 
ard of  England  and  other  countries,  which  both  only  further  the  plans 
or  tendencies  of  the  most  colossal  and  ruinous  commercial  conspiracy 
ever  known  in  the  history  of  mankind. 

1  refer  to  the  attempt  at  the  complete  and  universal  demonetization 
of  silver,  or  the  adoption  of  the  universal  gold  standard,  or  the 
despotic  recognition  of  gold  only  as  the  metal  out  of  which  the 
various  standards  of  value,  or  money  units,  shall  be  made  ;  leaving  com- 
merce thus  at  the  mercy  of  the  owners  of  the  metal,  gold,  driving 


THE   ALPHA    OF   MONEY-  < 

'the  metal,  silver,  as  money,  out  of  the  markets  of  the  world  in  spite 
of  the  fact  that  it  is  sorely  needed  and  would  be  a  respectable 
rival  to  gold,  so  much  so,  that  were  there  not  an  ounce  of  gold  in 
the  world  its  money  business  could  be  done  upon  silver.  Is  there, 
therefore,  any  good  reason  why  they  might  not  each  be  used  upon  their 
own  merit  as  money  V  If  the  ideas  here  advocated  were  carried  out,  sil- 
ver money  could  be  borrowed  and  lent ;  labor  could  be  paid  in  it,  and  it 
would  becom*^,  thereby,  a  storer  of  force,  of  wealth,  of  energy,  as  is  gold. 

Mr.  Carnegie  says  m  the  Nortli  Amtrican  Remtw,  of  June,  1891,  page 
748:  "1  vvoula  rather  give  up  the  'McKinley  bill'  and  pass  the  "MiU's  bill' 
if  lor  the  exchange  1  coulu  have  the  present  silver  bill  repealed  and 
Silver  trtated  like  other  metals." 

iiiat  IS  just  vvliat  is  here  advocated  ;  but  we  do  not  propose  to  leave 
the  legal  tender  and  Govermentaliy  recognized  standard  of  value,  unit 
of  price,  or  special  money  prop  under  goJd.  It  must  come  out  also.  We 
propose  to  allow  all  nieiais  a  fair  lieid  and  no  favor,  and  do  not  propose 
that  any  one  of  them  sliall  be  crowned  lord  of  all. 

The  demonetizaiion  of  silver  has  been  successful  in  England  by  vir- 
tue of  despotic  commercial  legislation  by  wluch  ilie  single  gold  standard 
is  forced  upon  her  commerce  and  people,  and  silver  proiiibited  from  use 
as  money,  in  tlie  true  sense  at  all,  t)eing  only  coined  as  the  tradesman's 
token  ol  the  Jiritish  government  in  representation  of  gold,  and  made 
legal  tender  at  its  nominal  value  for  a  limited  amount  thereof. 

Nearly  the  same  thing  has  been  done  in  this  country.  The  only  dif- 
ference IS  thai  we  have  made  tiie  silver  tokens  of  our  country  legal  ten- 
der for  a  larger  amount  of  gold  money,  except  where  otherwise  ex- 
pressed in  tiie  contract.  Therefore,  we  have  need  for  a  greater  propor- 
iioiiaie  amount  of  silver  tokens.  That  is,  our  legal  tender  is  possibly  a 
little  less  tough. 

Imagine  a  brass  token  having  on  one  side  the  legend,  "  John  Gough, 
Arcade  ."?aloon,"  and  on  the  other,  '"Good  for  Viy^  cents  in  trade."  Now 
our  Sliver  dollar  might  as  well  have  ''U.  S.'  printed  on  one  side,  and 
'•Good  for  one  dollar  or  ^'6  and  22-100  grains  of  pure  gold,  in  the  gold 
trade."  On  the  English  shilling  one  side  might  have  "Vic.  Vv'^^^  and  on 
the  otiier,  "Good  for  1-20  of  a  pound  sterling,  in  the  gold  trade."  The 
only  dilference  between  the  silver  token  and  the  brass,  under  our  present 
sysiem,  is  that  silver,  as  a  metal,  has  a  higher  price  as  compared  with 
gold.  ±'or  this  higher  price  no  thanks  are  due  either  to  the  l:5ritish  or 
the  American  governments.  It  is  only  sustained  by  ihe  fact  that  a  large 
part  of  liie  world  today  still  use  silver  out  of  which  to  make  money,  or 
itieir  "<lehijite  thing  commonly  used  as  a  price  standard." 

It  is  very  strange  that  British  statesmen,  who  are  generally  so  lib- 
eral in  their  views  as  to  trade,  should  be  so  arbitrarily  despotic  in  their 
ideas  regarding  a  '-price  standard"  or  money. 

One  would  think  that  a  consideration  of  the  fact  that  their  Na- 
tional debt  must  be  sweat  out  of  the  nation,  must  be  redeemed  in  the 
blood  of  linloiis,  would  lead  to  a  fail-,  impartial,  just  and  humane  con- 
sideration ot  the  question,  and  a  doubt  as  to  whether  it  was  their  duty  to 
specially  protect  gold  which  but  amounts  to  sacrihcing  tlie  industry 
and  the  wealth  of  tJie  nation.  'They  are  only  obliged  by  their  contract 
to  deliver  gold  to  the  creditor.  They  are  not  bound  to  make  the  gold  diffi- 
cult of  acquisition  to  the  man  who  must  pay  tlint  debt.  That  man  is  of 
necessity  the  laborer  of  every  kind  in  Jjritam  and  there  is  no  reason  why 
they  should  sacrihce  the  wealth  of  the  nation  to  the  JMoloch  of  the  sin- 
gle gold  standard. 

The  price  of  silver  in  the  ordinary  dollar  is,  say  70  cents,  as  reck- 
oned in  gold.  The  rest  is  "Mat"  or  promised  by  L'ncle  ISam  to  make 
"good,"  that  is,  as  good  as  the  gold  dollar  of  commerce.  In  the  United 
JStates  and  England,  silver  is  with  scrupulous  unscrupulousitv  kept  out 
of  commerce,  as  money,  in  the  true  sense,  and  allowed  only  to  appear  in 
bulk  as  bullion  and  as  I'ar  as  money  or  coinage  is  concerned,  only  subserves 
the  purpose  of  making  those  tokens  whose  office  is  to  facilitate  the  cir- 
culation of  gold.  That  is,  it  is  forced  to  suffer,  vicariously,  for  the  short- 
comings of  gold,  as  gold,  in  small  amounts,  is  an  inconvenient  money  as 
compared  with  silver. 

We  do  not  want  any  vicarious  atonement  in  trade,  but  should  insist 
that  every  commodity  should  work  out  its  own  salvation  in  fear  and 
trembling.  A  "standard  of  value,"  or  standard  of  price,  or  money,  is 
what  men  may  use  to  get  upon  a  commercial  understanding  with  each 


8  THE  ALPHA    OF   MONEY. 

Other.  It  is  not  a  ''ttxed  value"  as  our  single  gold  standard  men  would  * 
sometimes  claim,  for  there  is  no  such  thing  in  the  case  as  lixity  of  value, 
for  it  will  buy  ailferent  amounts  of  wheat,  apples,  wool,  iron,  oil,  salt, 
pepper,  meat,  tea,  wine  or  coffee  at  different  times  whereby  we  say  that 
the  value  or  price  of  these  articles  conslanily  tluctuates.  Jiut  if  we 
should  reckon  ur  compare  prices  with,  or  lu,  any  delinite  amount  of  any 
one  of  these  articles,  then  gold,  as  well  as  the  other  cuinmouities, 
and  even  the  immobile  and  immortal  gold  standard  of  value  would  go 
up  and  down  and  tremble  in  the  balance  at  times  as  nicely  as  any  of  the 
other  commodities  ;  and  wheat,  for  instance,  if  our  standard  of  value 
should  be  made  of  that,  would  seem  to  have  a  hxed  value.  Why?  Jie- 
cause  any  given  amount  of  wlieat,  measured  by  the  wheat  price  standard, 
must  ever  give  a  constant  number,  and  however  much  tlie  price  of  that 
given  amount  of  wheat  may  vary  as  reckoned  by  other  staiidaias,  us 
price  as  reckoned  by  the  wheat  standard  cannot  vary.  This  is  all  there 
is  to  the  hxity  of  value  argument. 

One  goou  reason  however  why  gold  and  silver  came  to  be  selected  as 
money  is  because  the  amount  or  quantity  of  them  is  not  subject  to  disas- 
trous lluctuations  as  are  the  amounts  of  other  perishable  commodities. 

A  wealth  of  paper  and  ink  has  been  exnausted  to  prove  tliat 
gold  has  a  "hxed  value"  ana  the  arguments  brought  forward  to  prove  it 
would  almost  force  or.e  to  impatieiiLly  exclaim:  What  xi^uroran  hum- 
bug I  J'he  Eugiishman's  "staiidard  of  value,"  or  money,  is  the  gold 
sovereign.  The  Mexican's  standard  of  value  is  his  silver  dollar  and  it  is 
an  lioiiLst  dollar,  although  it  may  i»e  worth  only  70  cents  as  reckoned  in 
American  gold  and  liuciuates  somewhat  in  value  or  rather  price  as  reck- 
oned in  that  gold.  K)t  course  tlie  Aiexican  fondly  and  innocently  im- 
agines that  it  IS  ills  silver  dollar  that  has  "nxeu  value  "  and  that  tiie 
6L/(t/a/<iy/x/6' are  your  sLidd  and  respectable  yellow  ladies  of  iiritaiii  and 
the  United  states.  Has  not  the  Englishman  a  perfect  right  to  think  in  his 
pound  sterling  if  he  wishes,  the  Mexican  in  Ins  peso  or  silver  dollar,  the 
Ciiinamen  in  sycee  or  cash,  tlie  tropical  Indian  m  cacao  beans,  the  i^las- 
kan  in  marten  skins,  or  the  somebody  else  in  cowries  or  the  anybody  else  in 
what  he  pleases  and  mentally  translate  all  other  values  or  prices  into  his 
own  y     Clearly  tliey  ah  have. 

We  do  not  wish  to  meddle  with  what  eacli  particular  person  or  com- 
munity may  take  as  a  standard  of  value  for  the  purpose  of  getting  into 
intelligible  trade  relationship,  it  is  very  clear  that  it  is  not  necessary  for 
the  carrying  on  of  commerce  that  the  world  should  all  use  tlie  same  sub- 
stance out  of  wJiich  to  make  '•standards  of  value"  so  called.  l  he  effect 
of  doing  so  would  be  to  inordinately  enhance  the  price  of  thiit  substance 
asguaged  in  tlie  price  of  the  otiier  commodities  and  with  respect  to  labor 
and  to  give  to  the  owners  of  gold  an  extraordinary  advantage  in  tiade 
and  one  that  is  not  theirs  by  natural  justice.  In  fact  we  see  that  gold 
by  special  favoritism  and  on  account  of  interest— a  worm  that  eats  both 
day  and  night— is  already  becoming  the  universal  wealth  absorbent,  es- 
pecially in  England  and  the  United  tstates. 

Money  after  all  is  but  a  sort  of  clearing  house  commodity  used  for 
the  convenience  of  trade.  Its  use  is  to  facilitate  exchange  and  bring 
about  more  perfect  barter  winch  virtually  amounts  to  exchanging  labor 
or  what  is  the  same  thing,  the  products  thereof.  We  will  not  talk  of  the 
origin  of  money,  nor  why  gold  and  silver  came  to  be  selected  as  money 
metals,  even  when  the  world  was  young  and  beiore  letters  were  invented. 

Gold  and  Sliver  were  pretty  and  strange,  did  not  alter  m  the  keeping, 
were  as  metals  malleable  and  very  manageable,  besides  being  scarce. 
They  no  doubt  attracted  the  eye  oi  Vanity  and  were  used  to  adorn  the 
person  of  Beauty,  which  took  wa  beauty  trom  them  ana  their  own  beauty 
and  consequentJy  value  was  vastly  enhanced  thereby.  'Ihe  arrangement 
was  of  mutual  benefit  and  eminently  satisfactory.  'These  metals  there- 
by became  as  gifts,  marks  of  appreciation,  tokens  of  wealth,  and,  to  some 
extent,  measures  of  love.  This,  no  doubt,  would  spur  the  endeavor 
of  mankind  to  obtain  them. 

No  doubt  merchandise  of  other  descriptions  w^as  offered  in  exchange 
for  them  and  when  they  were  made  into  pieces  of  dehnite  weight,  ex- 
ciiange  was  facilitated,  and  the  moment  that  these  pieces  became  "price 
standards"  or  unite  ol  value  in  any  community  then  the  idea  of  money 
was  at  once  innovated  and  barter  thereby  vastly  facilitated.  The  price 
or  exchange  rate  of  all  articles  would  be  referred  to  this  common,  con- 
stant barter  divisor  and  the  result  would  be  price  as  reckoned  in  that 
standard,  and  the  metal  out  of  which  this  money  was  made  thus  ac- 
quired a  new  and  wonderfully  important  use. 


THE   ALPHA   OF   MONEY.  9 

A  common  barter  trial  divisor  is  a  very  ^ood  definition  for  money 
and  virtually  means  the  same  as  the  one  already  given.  But  I  could  not 
use  this  latter  conveniently,  as  the  employment  of  the  word  "barter" 
would  bring  a  hornets  nest  about  my  ears,  for  we  are  told  by  impossible 
theorizers  that  we  have  gotten  far  beyond  barter  and  that  it  is  a  thing  of 
the  wild  and  woolly  past  ;  but  we  can  never  get  beyond  it  as  long  as  la- 
bor is  exchanged  for  labor  or  for  material  things  through  the  medium 
of  merchandise,  or  for  so  long  as  labor  is  paid,  or  love  lasts.  All  that  we 
can  possibly  do  is  to  facilitate  it.  to  make  it  more  nearly  perfect.  This 
is  done  to  a  great  extent  by  the  employment,  in  any  community,  of  a 
"price  standard"  or  unit  of  price  in  terms  of  which  the  prices  of  other 
ar:icles  may  be  expressed. 

A  man  who  can  buy  a  thing  for  so  many  price  units  in  one  place 
would  be  able  to  know  if  he  coula  make  a  proht  by  selling  it  in  another 
if  the  price  were  expressed  in  the  same  terms  or  price  uuits.  it  put  the 
matter  down  to  the  same  computative  basis  and  the  invention  or  rather 
innovation  of  money  was  one  of  the  easiest  things  in  the  world  and  not 
at  all  troublesome  or  complicated.  It  was  as  easy  as  falling  off  a  log. 
It  just  *come  so"  and  njan  had  as  little  sense  of  how  it  was  done  as  a 
bird  lias  of  liow  he  learned  to  sing.  This  theorizing  only  aods  another 
proof  to  the  fact  that  'T^ove  makes  the  world  go  round"  and  that  all 
noble  endeavor  has  its  spring  in  the  ambitions,  the  affections,  and  the 
aspirations  of  mankind.  This  indestructible  money  made  it  possible 
for  man  to  store  value,  and  by  labor  he  could  acquire  this  commonly 
acceptable  nierchandise  or  money,,  and  keep  it  it  if  necessary  until  ready 
to  expend  it  for  loved  ones  in  exchange  for  what  might  please  or  be  nec- 
essary fur  them. 

'ilie  oijject  of  Government  should  surely  be  to  increase  the  average 
liappiness.  Surely  this  can  not  be  done  by  making  laws  tending  to  make 
man  "a  poor  o'er  labored  wight"  eking  Out  a  scanty  existence  in  hard- 
ship and  through  the  exercise  of  constant,  unremitting  toil;  for  is  it  not 
written  "that  man  shall  not  live  by  bread  alone,"  and  the  "Laborer  is 
worthy  of  his  hire."  Js  it  not  true  that  man  has  a  right  to  himself  and 
all  that  he  honorably  produces  by  the  exercise  of  his  labor,  the  expenditure 
of  those  Olims  of  energy  with  which  God  endowed  him? 

The  above  concerning  the  origin  of  money,  etc.,  is  only  a  digression 
by  the  wayside,  a  rest  on  the  roc-^y  road  of  this  argument.  We  will  re- 
sume our  journey  by  saying  that  it  is  not- necessary  for  the  carrying 
on  of  trade  that  mankind  should  make  "price  standards"  out  of  one 
metal  only  and  that  such  metal  should  be  gold.  It  would  be  just  as 
rigliteuus  and  as  sensible  that  we  should  have  but  one  clearing  house 
wliich  sliould  be  situated  at  Constantinople,  or  Tobolsk,  or  at  Timbuctoo. 

One  part  of  the  same  country  may  use  a  silver  and  another  part  a 
gold  "standard  of  value"  or  "price  standard"  and  no  harm  be  done.  On 
the  contrary  it  might  be  of  great  benefit.  There  is  no  difficulty  in  these 
different  parts  trading  with  each  other  for  there  will  always  be  markets 
where  one  is  sold  for  the  other.  Let  the  commerce  of  the  world  estab- 
lish prices  by  natural  law.  It  is  no  part  of  any  Governments'  business. 
So  much  for  the  force,  the  fraud,  the  farce  of  the  one  to  the  sixteen  ar- 
rangement as  also  Jiritain's  despotic  gold  standard. 

We  are  no  more  in  need  in  these  United  States  nor  any  where  else 
the  world  of  a  recognized  and  protected  "standard  of  value"  for  the  ben- 
efit of  trade  than  we  are  of  a  recognized  creed  of  religion  for  the  benefit 
of  morality. 

The  situation  in  the  Congress  of  the  United  States  seems  to  be  that 
the  bland  silver  men  want  the  Government  to  pay  a  far  higher  price 
for  silver  as  reckoned  in  gold  than  it  can  be  bought  for  in  the  markets  of 
the  world,  'ilie  (Government  tries  ineffectually  to  get  silver  into  "circu- 
lation" but  as  her  silver  is  only  the  representative  of  gold  and  not  money 
01  itself,  and  as  the  Government  and  the  country  is  "banking"  on  gold, 
not  being  allowed  to  "bank"  on  anything  else  it  simply  happens  that  the 
"boys"  don't  need  any  more  "chips"  in  the  game.  Of  course  they  pile  up 
in  the  "treasury"  and  great  is  the  wail,  and  truly  the  distress  of  the  land 
is  fearful  to  contemplate.  Silver  owners  still  force  the  purchase  of  the 
substance  out  of  which  these  chips  are  made  forgetting  that  there  would 
be  an  unbounded  market  for  it  if  the  Government  special  protection, 
was  taken  from  the  gold  "unit  of  value"  and  they  were  both  coined  upon 
the  same  terms,  for  silver  could  at  once  come  into  use  as  money  in  the 
true  sense,  and  thus  complete  the  cycle  of  trade.     Commerce  could  thus 


10  THE  ALPHA    OF   MONEY. 

whirl  in  a  silver  orbit  as  well  as  in  a  gold  one.  A  silver  "price  standard" 
would  be  used  in  a  very  large  part  ol  it  not  ni  all  of  the  United  ^States 
and  by  natural  trade  law  or  custom.  Debts  could  be  contracted  m  silver 
and  business  done  upon  it,  thereby  breaking  up  the  golden  cult  before 
which  our  nation  and  people,  and  the  people  of  Britain  and  other  coun- 
tries are  forced  to  bow.  but  this  golden  calf  can  never  be  broken  up  by 
any  governmental  "parity  of  value"  or  one  to  sixteen  price  setting  rule 
of  any  kind  nor  by  any  protected  "price  standard"  or  -'unit  of  value." 

The  gold  men  in  liritain  and  the  United  States  and  others  countries 
demand  that  Government  shall  force  men  to  reckon  prices  hi  terms  of 
their  commodity  and  that  no  amount  of  any  other  thing  sliall  be  used  in 
the  true  sense  as  money  at  all.  They  demand  that  it  shall  be  recognized 
the  world  over  in  quantities  called  "pounds,"  "dollars,"  etc.,  as  the  only 
substance  out  of  which  money  shall  be  made  or  in  which  debts  shall  be 
made  or  contracted.  They  want  that  all  the  expensive  niaddueri)  of 
(joverrtpiei't  with  all  its  power  shall  be  (/iceu  the  tu  free  of  cost  to  carry 
out  this  very  laudable  Cnristlaa  and  humane  un.dertaktny. 

Let  us  pause  a  little  to  contemplate  the  ineffable  sweetness  of  this 
unassuming  and  delicate  modesty.  Let  us  not  approach  too  near  this 
candid  tlower  lest  we  contaminate  it.  Let  us  hats  off  enjoy  its  per- 
fume in  respectful  and  udmiring  suspense,  careful  lest  we  luctaveriently 
inar  or  crush  its  exquisite,  fragrant  beauty.  Perhaps  a  moment  spent 
in  such  ethereal,  moral  atmosphere  may  make  better  men  of  us. 

Gold  and  silver,  1  again  repeat,  are  commodities.  If  this  be  so 
neither  oX  these  metal  commodities  should  be  protected  any  more  than 
should  any  other  commodity,  i  mean,  of  course,  within  the  country, 
this  is  not  a  tarilf  argument.  It  follows  that  Government  has  no  right 
to  enhance  thn  price  of  either  of  these  commodities  at  the  expense  of 
any  other  commodity  or  commodities  be  they  what  they  may.  For  such 
Would  be  a  despotic,  interference  in  private  business,  unjust,  undemo- 
cratic, unrepublican,  unAmerican,  uniirittanic,  and,  in  reality,  inhuman. 
It  would  not  tend  to  promote  the  "public  wellare,"  "the  greatest  good  to 
tlie  greatest  number"  nor  the  "pursuit  of  liappiness"  nor  would  it  be 
"fair  play."  "Finance"  is,  according  to  this  view,  no  more  nor  less  than 
a  part  of  "trade." 

Congress  has  no  right  to  meddle  without  proper  warrant  in  the  pri- 
vate affairs  of  men  nor  to  infringe  unnecessarily  through  the  power  of 
the  law  upon  their  property  rights.  What  therefore  ougiit  Congress  or 
Government  to  do  in  the  matter? 

Answer.  It  ought  to  abandon  the  idea  that  it  i.s  or  ought  to  be  a 
"regulator  of  values"  or  a  maker  of  money,  at  least  in  that  sense.  It  lias 
no  right,  therefore,  to  adopt  a  "  standard  of  value,"  nor  to  designate  a 
certain  amount  of  a  certain  metal  to  be  the  National  "standard"  or- 
"  unit  of  value,"  or  the  detinite  thing  to  be  used  as  a  "  price  standard  " 
and  the  "  legal  tender  for  debts." 

There  cannot  justly  be  any  "legal  tender"  except  a  tender  of  the 
thing  contracted  to  be  paid.  A  "  dollar  "  undei  the  very  commonly  ac- 
cepted idea  of  a  certain  tixed  value  is  an  illusion,  a  delusion  and  a  snare. 
It  is  the  baseless  fabric  of  a  thousand  fallacies  and  the  fruitful  mother 
of  monetary  sophistries. 

Congress  has  a  right  to  adopt  a  standard  weight  or  exact  quantity 
for  dealing  in  these  precious  commodities  of  the  precious  metals  and 
coins,  and  it  would  be  a  ereat  public  commercial  convenience  for  it  to 
do  80.  For  instance,  a  weight  of  400  grains  troy,  is  for  many  reasons  the 
best  possible  that  could  be  thus  adopted. 

This  weight  I  take  the  liberty  to  call  a  "  mintweight,"  for  tlie  pur- 
pose of  this  article  and  the  abbreviation,  might  be  written  like  that  for 
the  word  "  mountain,"  but  with  the  cross  of  the  "t  "  drawn  clear  across 
the  "  M."  It  would  make  a  very  pretty  sign  in  case  it  should  ever  be 
used.  This  "  mintweight"  as  a  weight  is  not  to  be  forced  upon  anybody 
and  is  simply  to  be  used  at  the  I'nited  States  mint. 

I  prefer  this  400  grain  mint  for  many  reasons.  It  subdivides  beau- 
tifully, and  five  pounds  troy  is  exactly  seventy-two  times  as  heavy  as  the 
"  mintweight."  This  live  pounds  troy  of  pure  metal  would  make  seventy- 
two  containing  a  "mintweight"  each  of  pure  metal.  This  is  the  best 
that  you  can  possibly  do  with  the  troy  pound  of  5,7BO  grains.  It  relates 
itself  beautifully  to  the  ounce,  as  twelve  "  mintweights  "  would  be  equal 
to  one  ounce  troy,  and  through  the  grain  to  the  pound  avoirdupois  of 
7,000  grains.    The  grains  troy  and  avoirdupois  are  the  same. 


THE   ALPHA   OF   MONEY.  11 

The  Government,  however,  could  adopt  this  weight,  or  the  ounce 
troy,  or  any  other  weight,  as  the  basis  of  its  monetary  system,  or  rather 
coinage  system,  and  coin  it  with  its  various  subdivisions  or  convenient 
fractional  parts,  but  witli  the  abolition  of  arbitrary  price  and  "  legal 
tender  "  forever. 

But  some  one  will  say,  why  not  coin  our  silver  and  gold  as  we  do  now 
and  let  them  go  tree  by  abolishing  the  ratio  V  Of  course  it  would  be 
understood  redeeming  all  silver  coins  theretofore  coined  at  their  nominal 
value  in  gold  and  retiring  them  from  circulation,  as  they  are  but  United 
States  gold  notes  printed  on  silver. 

This  at  lirst  glance  looks  like  a  very  brilliant  idea,  and  would  in 
truth  be  an  improvement  and  a  grand  one  over  the  method  now  in  vogue, 
but  the  objections  to  it  are  not  so  slight  nor  so  easily  overcome  as  lirst 
might  appear. 

The  hrst  objection  to  this  plan  is  this  :  As  it  has  been  shown  that 
standard  coins  realiy  subserve  the  purpose  of  convenience  in  weighing 
and  computation,  then  why  nut  have  convenient  systems  and  coins  for 
tliat  purpose  which  the  present  system  and  coins  are  not.  For,  why 
should  gold  be  bought  and  sold  by  a  certai^i  very  inconvenient  weight, 
namely,  2H.2:i  grains  of  pure  gola  coined  into  standard  gold  9-10  fine  and 
called  a  dollar,  and  silver  be  bought  and  sold  by  another  very  inconven- 
ient weight,  Tiamely,  371.25  grains  pure  silver,  coined  into  a  piece  weigh- 
ing 4i".i.5  grains,  9-10  tine,  and  also  called  a  dollar? 

xVs  they  are  or  should  be  dealt  in  by  weight,  why  should  they  not  be 
dealt  in  by  the  same  weight?  Would  this  not  be  vastly  to  the  conven- 
ience of  trade,  computation  and  comparison? 

Why  should  one  pound  not  be  used  for  coffee,  for  instance,  and  an- 
otLier  sixteen  times  as  heavy  for  apples,  because  the  Government  in  its 
wisdom  had  set  such  an  exchange  ratio  between  themV 

Why  should  these  cheap  metals  of  alloy  be  considered  at  all  in  mon- 
etary tai»les  and  considerations  when  it  is  the  precious  metal  that  we  are 
dealing  in,  and  the  cheap  metal  alloyed  is  practically  worthless,  to  be 
considered  as  the  vehicle  in  which  the  goods  are  carried — the  tare  with 
whicli  they  are  mixed. 

The  next  objection  centers  about  the  word  "dollar."  A  dollar,  we 
take  it,  is  or  ougbt  to  be  the  name  of  a  silver  coin,  all  from  Joachmisthal 
in  Germany,  where  such  a  piece  was  originally  coined  and  called  in  Ger- 
man a  tluiler,  from  which  our  word  dollar  is  derived.  8o  we  take  it  that  the 
word  dollar  naturally  belongs  to  a  silver  coin,  which  when  minted  by 
(lovernment  according  to  custom  would  be  or  might  be  money.  In  any 
case  it  should  be  the  name  of  a  dehnite  quaiiUty  of  a  certain  metal,  and 
not  the  title  of  a  fantastic  and  imaginary  amount  of  a  mutative  and 
mystic  essence  called  value,  which  it  is  hoped  to  fix,  realize  and  material- 
ize under  the  spell  of  that  magic  name,  a  dollar. 

.Such  is  the  majestic  power  of  that  awful  divinity  that  doth  hedge  a 
Government  that  many  people  believe  that  such  a  thing  can  be  accom- 
plished by  iiiijiat,  andis  in  fact  and  in  deed  embalmed  with  the  placid 
lace  of  our  (ioddess  of  Liberty  upon  the  bit  of  metal  where  the  repre- 
sentation of  her  pleasant  countenance  be  impressed. 

Now  that  we  have  raised  the  ghost  of  the  word  value,  which  means 
different  tilings  at  different  times,  we  must  make  a  clear  path  through 
this  thorny  and  rocky  territory  by  telling  what  we  mean  by  "value," 
We  can  not  do  this  better  than  Ly  giving  a  few  illustrative  examples 
of  value,  etc.  Commercial  or  exchange  value  is  price  as  reckoned  in 
some  standard.  Hut  the  word  value  as  ordinarily  used,  is  often  a  personal 
appreciation,  and  a  nuitter  which  varies  greatly  with  the  same  man  at 
different  times,  and  with  different  men  ai  the  same  time  and  under  the 
same  circumstances.  It  is  born  of  man's  needs,  wants,  desires,  neces- 
sities, fancies  and  character.  A  dollar,  for  instance,  may  *•  seem  as  big 
as  a  cartwheel  "  to  one  man  and  be  as  nothing  to  another,  but  its  price 
in  the  market,  or  its  commercial  value,  is  one  dollar.  A  perishing  man 
in  a  desert  may  give  the  substance  of  a  lifetime  for  a  gallon  of  water, 
for.  such  is  the  value  that  it  has  acquired  in  his  eyes  that  such  is  the 
price  he  is  willing  to  pay.  If  it  saved  life,  he  might  afterwards  even  be 
thankful  of  the  opportunity  that  allowed  him  to  make  the  exchange. 
A  man  may  sell  a  great  heritage  for  a  mess  of  pottage  worth  but  a  few 
cents,, so  great  being  the  urgency  of  th'e  situation,  and  this  same  thing 
has  been  done  to  save  life.  ISuch  is  the  value  that  a  boiled  dinner  has 
acquired  in  the  eyes  of  a  starving  man,  that  such  a  price  was  demanded 
and  paid. 


12  THE   ALPHA    OF   MONKY- 

We  are  not  dealing  no>v  with  the  extortionists  who  commit  these 
outrages  upon  tlie  "-JSon  of  Man";  we  are  only  talking  of  trade  and 
'"value."  A  man  hard  pressed  by  swift  and  murderous  pursuers  might 
trade  a  "Kingdom  for  a  horse,"  and  even  thank  God  for  ttie  opportunity 
congratulating  himself  that  he  had  done  well,  or  at  least  'as  well  as 
could  be  expected  under  the  circumstances."  It  would  not  matter  much 
to  him  wheLlier  the  horse  was  a  "cayuse,"  well  paid  for  at  twenty-hve 
dollars  in  the  horse  market,  or  a  Goldsmith  Alaid  worth  thousands,  for 
in  reality  it  was  not  horses  he  was  buying,  but  life. 

It  is  said  that  some  men  will  even  put  a  price  upon  honor  and  it  has 
been  said  that  legislators  sworn  to  be  faithful  to  the  interests  of  the 
people  have  even  done  the  same,  thus  betraying  the  confidence  reposed 
in  them.  We  are  not  dealing  with  such  scoundrelism  and  the 
example  of  Iscariot  will  be  our  only  one  of  this  sort.  A  man  has  been 
known  to  sell  to  malignant  persecutors  his  l)est  friend  in  whom  there 
was  no  wrong,  and  the  price  lie  put  upon  this  betrayal  was  thirty  pieces 
of  silver  and  agreed  witual  to  point  him  out  to  his  enemies  by  an  affec- 
tionate salute  which  was  after  all  but  adding  treachery  to  greater 
treachery. 

Another  man,  a  namesake  of  the  man  mentioned  above  but  who 
did  not  resemble  him  in  any  way,  except  in  the  fact  that  the  minds  of 
both  were  ever  upon  prohtable  thoughts  intent,  counseled  the  sale  of  his 
brother  to  the  Egyptian  merchants  for  twenty  pieces  of  silver,  liut  this 
latter  Judah  has  good  reasons  as  he  saw  that  it  whs  probably  the  most 
expedient  tiling  to  do  under  the  circumstances.  It  would  quiet  quarrels 
and  it  was  very  improbable  tliat  a  man  sold  in  Egypt  in  slavery  would 
ever  be  heard  of  again.  Hiid  if  he  was,  and  the  trutn  came  out,  Judah, 
himself  at  least,  could  plead  that  it  was  a  dire  resort  wliicli  he  had  pro- 
posed to  save  his  brother's  life,  and  could  probably  put  hiiniself  square 
with  his  brother  and  tne  old  man  as  well,  it  got  rid  of  this  brilliant  and 
somewhat  pretentious  son  of  another  woman,  the  only  rival  in  ability 
and  possibly  in  his  father's  altections  that  he  was  likely  to  have  among 
all  his  brothers,  and  it  got  rid  of  him  on  the  score  of  humanity.  It 
would  bring  about  harmony  and  give  him  "a  pull"  on  his  brothers  which 
he  would  know  how  to  "work."  JrJesides  it  had  the  merit  of  beiugprolit- 
able  and  no  doubt  squared  the  expense  of  their  banquet  and  bit  of  a 
spree  leaving  some  money  in  the  fraternal  treasury.— -bee  (ienesis,  Chap- 
XXXVll.  lie  did  not  propose  to  stand  and  die  it  necessary  in  defense 
of  his  brother.  That  would  not  have  been  in  accordance  with  his  char- 
acter for  there  would  have  been  nothing  in  it  for  him.  He  did  not  trouble 
himself  with  what  a  life  in  slavery  might  be.  In  fact  he  sees  his  own  in- 
terests and  was  not  accustomed  to  trouble  himself  in  trade  or  otherwise 
with  the  other  fellows.  That  may  be  \^U  to  preachers  and  patriots  and 
Mr.  Oanegie's  "unsuccessful"  men.  iSuch  men  may  live  and  leave  the 
world  better  for  having  lived  in  it  and  depart  from  it  leaving  small  store 
of  worldly  gear,  when,  if  their  talents  had  been  "properly"  directed  iheir 
efforts  might  have  made  them  rich.  When  we  read  his  history  we  see 
that  he  was  great  and  able,  a  good  judge  of  human  nature,  and  a  master 
of  expedience.  He  could  powerfully  plead  and  eloquently  preach  hu- 
manity and  justice  upon  occasion,  and  was  probably  a  very  pleasant 
after  dinner  talker,  and,  no  doubt,  a  shining  ligiit  at  the  banquet  given 
by  Joseph,  his  brother  ;  that  right  hand  of  monopoly  when  they  drank 
and  were  merry  with  him.— 8ee  Genesis,  XLll  and  XLIA'.  He  vvas  once 
forced  U)  confession,  but  then  the  sunoundhigs  had  been  out  of  the  com- 
mon and  of  a  tendency  to  diminish  his  native  caution.  He  was  caught 
by  rather  a  brilliant  lady  of  his  own  household  whom  he  had  lied  to  and 
deceived  in  a  matter  of  exceeding  importance  to  her.  probably  with  the 
motive  uf  continually  securing  this  active  young  person's  domestic  ser- 
vices for  nothing.  She  knew  the  old  man's  character  perfectly  well  and 
tiierefore  exacted  pledges  from  him  through  which  he  was  afterwards 
forced  to  -acknowledge  the  corn"  and  make  a  virtue  of  a  necessity. 
After  ah  it  did  not  affect  his  hnancial  standing,  and,  did  it  not  save'a 
lady  who  had  ties  upon  him  from  being  stoned  to  death?  This  man 
would  not  have  sold  his  best  friend  for  thirty  pieces  of  silver  in  the  same 
manner  that  his  namesake  did,  for  he  iss  a  prudent  man  and  has  a  cau- 
tious eye  on  the  hereafter.  He  believes  in  getting  a  "cinch"  on  the  good 
tilings  of  this  world  and  on  those  of  the  next  without  losing  his  grip  here. 
He  is  no  stranger  at  church  and  even  sometimes  occupies  tlie  pulpit 
where  he  is  generally  a  good  "preacher"  if  not  a  man.      He   may  some- 


TllK   ALFllA   OF   MONEY,  13 

times  be,  but  not  always,  a  hypocrite.  He  selects  his  friends  generally 
with  an  eye  to  their  capacity  tor  "standing  in"  and  they  are  seldom,  it' 
ever,  ot  the  "scum  of  the  earth."  iSucli  was  the  rich  stockman,  ''liirah 
the  AduUamite"  a  man  no  doubt  after  his  own  heart.  He  would  not 
murder  except  under  extraordiary  circumstances  and  then  probably  the 
"blood  would  be  on"  somebody  else  for  pay  or  otherwise.  He  knows 
that  they  who  draw  the  sword  "will  perish  by  the  sword."  He  may  be  a 
good  husband  and  a  kind  father  who  frequently  rears  his  son  well  for 
tiie  struggle  of  this  world  saying  to  him  "get  thee  money  my  son  hon- 
estly if  ilite  can  but  get  thee  money."  He  is  often  a  successful  man  of 
business  with  a  "levei  head." 

If  people  tell  about  the  hnancial  troubles  of  the  country  and  the 
hardships  they  are  enduring  he  wilj  probably  tell  them  that  it  is  extrav- 
agance does  it,  tliat  they  must  cut  their  bacon  thinner,  and  get  up  ear- 
lier in  the  morning,  ana  shut  down  on  so  many  calico  Uresses  for  the  old 
woman  and  tlie  girlis,  they  are  getting  too  high-toned,  and  that  the  boys 
should  be  taken  from  school,  and  that  God  knows  that  he  pays  taxes 
enough,  and  was  helping  the  country  now'  by  holding  its  bonds,  building 
railroads,  putting  up  National  banks  for  it  and  improving  the  country, 
and  that  lie  was  getting  mighty  little  thanks  for  all  the  gratitude  he  de- 
served. He  would  tell  them  that  the  financial  system  was  all  right,  that 
it  just  come  so,  and  was  built  on  the  sweet  law  of  nature  that  "aoeth  all 
things  well"'  or  that  it  was  made  by  "wise  tinanciers"  and  good  business 
men"  and  cannot  be  improved.  He  would  surely  not  steal  from  you  un- 
less he  could  do  it  safely  he  is  never  a  common  thief,  it  does  not  pay. 
He  keeps  within  the  pale  of  the  law,  and  often  is  engaged  in  having  laws 
made  that  will  keep  without  his  palings.  He  is  the  man  that  we  are  to 
make  laws  for,  but  he  oftener  makes  laws  for  us.  He  foments  no  rebel- 
lion unless  it  be  to  further  private  gain,  and,  as  he  does  not  like  risks,  he 
seldom  brings  war  about  as  it  paralyzes  industry,  but  when  it  does  come 
he  will  look  after  the  fat  contract  and  depreciated  government  paper  and 
have  his  wallet  nicely  lined  with  it  when  it  rises  to  its  nominal  value. 
He  would  make  a  good  servant  of  tyranny  or  a  good  hustler  under  a 
perfect  foim  of  arovernment.  He  would  probably  try  to  be  financially 
successful'  under  any  system  without  caring  at  the  expense  of  whom. 
He  struggles  to  get  on  the  right  side  of  the  monopoly  fence,  and  with 
the  upper  dog  in  every  hght.  He  takes  the  world  as  it  is  and  we  should 
lake  him  as  he  is.  1  have  nothing  to  say  against  him.  He  is  often  a 
kind  hearted  good  fellow,  but  that  is  no  reason  why  a  (Government  should 
make  laws  that  take  the  nation's  cornucopia  and  hold  it  in  such  man- 
ner that  he  may  glut  himself  of  the  fuUness  thereof  without  due  return. 

We  beg  the  reader's  pardon  tor  detaining  him  so  long  on  the  subject 
of  Judah,  which  was  not  necessary  to  the  substance  of  this  argument. 
We  will  resume  our  discourse  upon  "value,"  with  a  few  words  on  water. 

Water  is  an  exceedingly  valuable  article  but  of  very  small  price  in 
nearly  every  part  of  the  world.  It  is  the  universal  solvent  and  a  great 
chemical  agent  and  reagent.  Even  the  sea  captain  who  spurned  its  use 
as  a  beverage  frankly  admitted  that  it  was  a  "mighty  good  thing  to  float 
ships  in,"  thus  bearihg  witness  to  its  great  utility.  A  gallon  of  water 
on  the  shores  of  the  great  lakes  would  hardly  be  worth  the  getting,  and 
of  iniinitesimalif  of  any  commercial  value.  It  might  become  more  val- 
uable, commercially,  on  the  Mohave  desert,  where  it  has  been  sold  at  two 
bits  a  bucket,  it  gets  another  value  in  the  "arid  region"  when  taken 
around  in  ditches,  and  is  sold  at  another  price,  and  at  another  when  taken 
through  cities  in  pipes. 

If  all  the  water  that  be  in  the  substance  of  your  body,  were 
by  magic  extracted  at  once,  it  would  be  no  joke,  or  if  by  any  stretch 
of  the  imagination  it  could  be  called  a  joke,  it  would  certainly  be  a  very 
dry  one.  After  it  was  out  it  would  probably  not  be  worth  much  or  any 
more  than  the  same  amount  of  distilled  water,  but  you  would  probably 
pay  very  high  to  prevent  its  being  withdrawn,  which  is  to  say,  that  it 
was  very  valuable  to  you  when  in  the  right  place. 

Congealed  water  is  often  sold  by  the  pound  because  of  its  property 
of  reducing  the  teinperatue  of  comestibles  to  a  point  below  which  the 
energies  of  the  destructive  and  omnipresent  fermentation  germ  is 
capable  of  being  actively  developed.  It  is  not  water  that  is  sold  in  this 
case,  but  the  presence  of  the  absence  of  heat;  and  this  is  not  the  only 
paradox  of  selling  the  absence  of  something.  Water  is  often  not  only  a 
very  valuable,  but  even  a  necessary  article,  even  in  places  where  it  is  as 


14  TllK   ALi'llA    OF    MONEY. 

tree  as  water.  That  is  the  utility  value  with  which  we  are  not  deHling, 
aicuough  special  utility  may  be  the  cause  of  value  in  trade  for  whica 
men  will  pay  a  price,  and  tnis  is  a  value  with  which  tliis  essay  is  inter- 
ested. 

A  poor  widow  gave  two  mites  to  a  contribution,  and  this  was  reck- 
oned oi  more  value  oy  our  8avior  ttian  tlie  Itiige  concribu Lions  of  ricli 
men.  They  gave  of  tneir  pieuLy.  fShe  gave  of  ner  poverty  all  she  had, 
in  the  name  of  humanity,  to  help  auvance  the  gospel  of  love,  the 
glory  of  tlie  Kingdom  of  peace  on  earth,  and  goodwill  toward  men. 
one  gave  them  freely,  and  "the  JLord  loveth  a  cheerful  giver."  Valued  in 
tne  scale  of  Divine  justice  their  price  would  purchase  an  extremely  large 
reward  for  the  spirit  of  self  sacriiice  there  shown. 

vVith  this  value  and  this  price  tliis  essay  is  not  dealing.  They  were 
probably  tne  savings  tor  a  long  time  of  a  weaK  old  woman,  and  oi  a 
great  value  to  tier  in  a  worldly  sense  as  measured  by  lier  olood,  or  labor, 
or  vital  energy,  or  capacity  for  money  gettiiig,  and  in  consideration  of 
her  necessities,  iier  failing  powers  and  noiioraoie  pride,  they  were  very 
near  to  ner.  liut  their  pz/ce  m  the  niarutt  was  two  iiiiCtti.  With  this 
latter  value  and  price  we  may  deal  more  or  less  scientilically  in  this 
essay. 

juet  us  resume  our  consideration  of  the  dollar  and  the  word  '"dollar." 
If  the  word  aoiictr  means  a  certain  delinite  numuer  of  grains  of  a  certain 
metal  called  silver,  it  cannot  at  the  same  time  be  a  certain  diiferent  number 
of  grains  of  a  diiferent  metal  called  gold,  nor  are  they  the  same  thing. 
Tliereiore  tiiey  snould  not  be  known  by  the  same  name,  i^ut  tliere  is  no 
douut  111  tuese  United  Stales  aoout  what  the  word  "dollar,"  as  used  by  the 
United  States  governiubnc,  means.  These  argumenis  as  to  what  it  ougnt 
to  mean,  fouuued  on  tne  aerivation  of  the  word  are  of  iio  use.  It  nas 
been  made  oy  legal  enactment  of  the  Congress  of  the  United  States  to 
mean  '"^h.h  grains  of  standard  gold  which  snail  be  tlie  unit  or  value." 
standard  gold  IS  ii-lU  hue,  therefore  the  dollar  contains  Z'6:i'iL  grains  of 
pure  gold  or  of  gold,  it  is  tne  money  of  the  country  by  legal  enactment, 
and  the  language  and  intent  is  plain,  positive  and  unmistakable.  It  is 
true  tliat  as  a  unit  it  is  practically  not  coined,  although  tliere  is  a  provis- 
ion for  coining  the  one  dollar  pieces.  i3ut  multiples  of  it  called  ".Lagles," 
"double  Eagles,"  "lialf  Eagles,"  or  J{t>10,  ^'tiM,  i^h  pieces,  etc.,  are  coined  in 
large  quantities,  and  are  standard  coins  of  gold. 

Tne  "Silver  dollar"  contains  412.5  grains  of  silver  9-10  tine,  and  is  to 
a  certain  extent  "legal  tender"  at  its  "nominal  value."  which  means  that 
the  "silver  dollar"  i£>  not  a  dollar  at  all,  and  might  just  as  well  be  called 
a  "sneak."  It  is  a  sort  of  a  dollar  in  law,  except  where  'otherwise 
expressly  stipulated  in  the  contract."  It  is  in  no  sense  a  standard  coin. 
It  does  not  matter  much  whether  it  contain  a  few  grains  more  or  less  of 
silver,  than  tlie  412.5  grains  of  standard  coinage  silver  of  which  it  is 
made,  as  it  does  not  travel  on  its  own  merit,  and  Uncle  Sam  is  the  man 
who  puts  up  for  it  with  25.»  grains  of  standard  coinage  gold  9- 10  tine. 

We  are  said  to  coin  at  the  ratio  of  one  to  sixteen,  but  anybody  who 
will  multiply  25.8  by  J6  will  get  a  result  412. «  instead  of  412.5  grains,  a 
shortage  of  '6-VO  of  a  grain.  A  matter  of  no  consequence  to  the  holder 
of  a  toKen  coin,  perhaps.  Tins  is  doing  pretty  tairiy,  but  not  following 
the  one  to  sixteen  arrangement  with  the  exactitude  wliich  we  should 
have  expected.  Besides  this  we  have  the  liglit  "subsidiary"  coins,  "half 
dollars,"  "quarter  dollars"  and  "dimes, '  which  are  i:4.U8  grains  of  silver 
lighter,  or  :^0.7  grains  of  standard  coinage  silver  lighter  for  every  "dollar" 
as  compared  with  the  "dollar  of  our  dads." 

We  are  trying  to  get  the  Government  out  of  its  coinage  muddle  and 
propose  to  com  a  standard  coin  of  silver,  it  does  not  matter  as  we  said 
before,  what  the  weight  of  our  old  "silver  dollars"  were,  as  they  were 
only  representative  of  gold,  and  upheld  at  their  nominal  value  by  the 
Hat  so  called,  but  in  reality  by  the  substantial  backing  of  Uncle  Sam. 
*  We  propose  to  coin  a  coin  of  silver  whose  halves,  quarters  and  tenths 
are  really  halves,  quarters  and  tenths,  and  propose  4uO  grains  troy  as  tlie 
weight  of  the  pure  silver  in  this  new  coin.  It  would  contain  28:^4  grains 
pure  silver  more  than  the  "dollar  of  our  dads,"  which  contains  371.25 
grains  pure  silver.  If  made  of  standard  silver  9-10  line,  to  which  we 
have  no  objection,  it  would  weigh,  alloy  and  all,  444  4-9  grains,  and  would 
be  81  17-18  lieavier  than  the  "dollar  of  our  dads,"  of  412.5  grains. 
Thirtv-one  and  seventeen- eighteenths  grains  is  about  4-5  the  weight  of 
our  present  10-cent  piece,  which  weighs  38.58  grains  standard  silver. 
The  difference  in  weight  between  this  and  the  "dollar  of  our  dads" 


THE   ALPHA   OF   MONEY.  15 

would  not  be  strongly  noticed  in  ordinary  handling.  It  would  make  a 
sensible  and  magnniceiii  com  under  every  conception. 

Now  comes  the  question  of  a  name.  JSomebody  says,  what's  in  a 
name?  Mot  much,  perUaps,  but  there  is  a  great  deal  in  tlie  thing  to  be 
named.  Any  congressional  chemist  will  ten  you  that  we  cannot  be  too 
exact  in  our  nomenclature.  We  cannot  cail  our  new  standara  silver  coin 
a  dollar,  because  that  name  is  already  given  to  the  "unit  ot  value"  or 
these  United  states,  which  is  the  "dollar  of  25.8  standard  goia."  l>esides 
if  we  aid,  the  "silver  men"  would  urop  "bimetaiism"  ana  immeaiateiy 
claim  tliat  it  should  be  recognizea  as  tne  "unit  of  value"  by  the  (jioverii- 
menc  of  the  United  States,  and  "legal  tender  for  all  debts,  both  public 
ana  private." 

±  Here  is  no  doubt  a  struggle  in  existence  for  the  name  dollar  and 
the  heritage  supposed  to  go  with  it.  John  felierman  against  this 
might  have  to  Ugnt  the  silver  men  on  new  ground  witn  weaker  batteries, 
lur  some  of  the  oiU  goia  guns  mignt  Oe  spiKeU  or  perUitps  turned  against 
liim.  w  hat  was  sauce  lor  the  goose  would  be  sauce  for  the  ganuer. 
The  plan  would  never  Uo.  VV  e  ao  not  want  a  legally  recognized  una  pro- 
tecieu  Sliver  "unit  of  value"  or  money.     We  simply  want  fair  play. 

\v  e  Want  It  unaerstood  that  we  are  not  a  "silver  man"  nor  a  "gold 
man,"  out  tliat  we  are  laooring  to  ao  exact  justice  in  the  case  ana  to  get 
Uncie  ham  out  of  this  aitticulty  and  put  him  where  he  may  live  m "peace 
una  amity  witn  all  metals  and  in  entangling  alliances  witn  none." 

The  hrst  step  in  the  movement  is  to  mint  a  sensible  stanUard  coin  of 
silver  vvitii  no  split  silver  grains  in  it  and  no  '"subsidiary"  or  other  nonsense 
aoout  11.  ihis  IS  our  proposed  piece  containing  4UU  grains  of  pure  silver. 
\v  e  ueea  a  name  for  it,  and  propose  the  name  of  an  "argent."  iSow  we 
have  a  stanaard  weight  wnich  we  have  called  a  "mintweight,"  but  we 
nave  no  name  lor  the  one  huadredth  part  of  this  weight,  ana  we  pro- 
pose lor  that,  the  name  "Karat,"  whicn  is  an  oia  name  lor  exactly  what 
we  want,  that  is,  lour  grains  troy.  We  have  haa  no  trouble  about  that 
except  to  aig  it  up. 

xNow  wiiat  will  we  call  the  1  100  part  of  our  "argant."  We  can  not 
call  It  a  "cent,"  as  that  is  a  name  already  appropriated  and  of  not  much 
consequence  as  it  means  one  per  centum  anyhow  Our  coinage  laws  tell 
us  plainly  wnat  a  dollar  means,  but  they  do  not  bother  much  about  a 
'•cent."  iiut  as  every  school  boy  has  learned  that  "100  cents  make  one 
Uoiiar,"  1  suppose  ot  course  that  custom  and  usage  have  made  it  to  mean 
l-ioutn  of  a  uollar,  and  that,  like  Gill,  it  must  "come  tumbling  after"  as 
itie  1-luUth  part  of  the  "unit  of  value"  of  Zb  and  8-lOtli  grains  of  stand- 
ara goia,  tliougu  pernaps  the  auureviation  "ct,"  might  still  be  used  as 
simply  meaning  1-iuUtli. 

If  we  call  tne  hundreth  part  of  our  "Argent"  a  "karat"  it  would  not 
do,  for  our  "Karat"  is  simply  a  weight  of  four  grains  troy  of  pure  metal 
and  usea  by  itself  means  simply  this  and  nothing  more.  ^50  we  will 
avail  ourseif  of  the  "at"  in  the  word  '"karat"  ana  call  it  an  "Argat," 
which  means  the  1- 100th  of  an  "argent"  and  contains  four  grams  troy  or 
one  karat  of  pure  silver.  8o  that  the  "mintweight"  and  "karat"  are  to 
be  usea  oy  the  United  States  government  in  aeaiing  in  gold  and  silver, 
etc.;  and  the  "argent"  is  a  coin  containing  a  mintweight  of  pure  sil- 
ver and  an  argat  is  the  1- 100th  part  of  this  coin  and  contains  one  karat 
of  pure  silver.  The  (jovernment  would  also  deal  in  all  standard  coins 
of  silver  and  in  silver  bullion  by  the  same  rule  and  receive  them  accord- 
ing to  the  quantity  of  pure  metal  they  contain  as  reckoned  in  mint- 
weights  ana  karats,  if  it  paid  for  them  the  "equipoisant"  or  "equiva- 
lent'  in  American  coin  it  would  give  one  argent  for  every  mintweight 
of  silver  received.  We  have  now  made  a  great  advancement  toward  the 
bridge  over  which  the  world  must  inevitably  pass  in  this  weary  march 
to  light  and  liberty. 

SILVER  COINS. 

Our  new^  silver  coinage  table  would  be  as  follows  if  we  used  the 
same  grade  of  silver  tor  making  coins  as  the  United  States  has  custom- 
arily used  heretofore,  which  is  coinage  silver  .900  hue  alloyed  with  cop- 
per that  is  to  say,  9-lOths  by  weight  silver  and  one  tenth  copper. 

1  Argent  or  100  Argats  9  loths  fine,  weighs  444  4-9  grains,  contains  400  grains  pure  silver. 
Vz         "       or    50         •'  "  "       '222  2-d        "  •'  2D0       '•  "■ 

%        "      or    25        "  "  "      1111-9       "  "         lOu      "  " 

1-10     "       or     10         "  "  "         444-9        "  "  40       "  " 

1-20     "       or      5         "  "  "         22  2-9        "  "  20       "  " 


16  TIIJL;   AJLi'llA    Of   MOJSiKY. 

We  might  here  treat  of  alloys,  but  must  move  on.  A  slight  differ- 
ence in  the  composition  often  makes  a  great  difference  in  the  quality 
and  peculiarities  of  an  alloy.  There  are  or  at  least  may  be,  1  presume, 
better  alloys  of  coinage  for  gold  and  silver  than  the  ones  used  by  the 
United  States  government.  In  the  system  of  coinage  here  pioposed, 
any  one  of  them  could  easily  be  adopted  fur  we  only  insist  that  the 
quantity  of  precious  metal  in  the  standard  coins  which  we  propose  should 
Le  religiously  and  scrupulously  exact,  constant  and  unfailing.  We  do 
not  stickle  so  much  over  what  the  tare  may  be  so  that  it  is  a  good  one 
for  the  purpose  of  handling  and  abrasion. 

GOLD   COI.J.S. 

We  will  now  pass  on  to  the  consideration  of  gold,  which  we  will 
treat  in  the  same  way.  But  w^e  would  not  call  any  of  our  gold  pieces  a 
"Dollar,"  as  that  is  the  name  already  appropriated  by  the  United  States 
government  to  mean  25  and  8-10  grains  of  standard  gold  of  the  United 
States  mint,  which  is  9-10  line,  and  has  also  been  designated  as  the  "unit 
of  value,"  all  by  the  most  formal  and  solemn  of  legal  enactment.  Nor 
can  we  call  it  an  "Eagle,"  whicli  has  been  appropriated  in  designating 
certain  gold  coins  containing  multiple  weights  of  the  dollar.  We  there- 
fore propose  a  new  name,  and  will  call  our  new  gold  coin  containing  a 
"mintweight"  of  gold  , by  the  name  of  an'"Orent."  Following  the  metliod 
used  before,  we  will  call  the  I-IUO  part  of  tliis  an  "Orat."  to  contain  a 
karat  of  gold. 

Our  gold  coinage  table  would  then  be  as  follows,  using  the  standard 
gold  of  the  United  States  mint,  which  is  .9U0  tine: 

1      Orent  or  loo  Orats  weij^lis  444  4-i)  grains  and  contains  4(  0  grains  of  pure  gold. 
■'2  "  50      "  "         222  2-9       "  "  200         '• 

H        "         25    "        ''       lui-y     ''  '        100       '' 

1-10       "  10      "  ''  44  4-9       "  ''  40 

1-20      "  5      ''  '•  22  2-9       '•  "  20         " 

It  must  be  remembered  that  the  gold  coins  of  the  United  states  are 
standard  coins  inasmuch  as  they  stand  on  their  own  merits.  The  silver 
coins  are  not  standard  coins  but  only  representative  of  gold.  Our  new 
silver  coins,  however,  would  be  standard  coins  and  would  represent 
themselves  aud  stand  on  their  own  merit.  A  standard  com  of  silver  is 
of  a  necessity  in  the  United  States  and  must  be  made  before  we  get  out 
of  this  fearful  financial  tangle  wiiere  our  "able  hnanciers"  put  it.  Our 
gold  coins  mean  what  they  say  and  stand  on  their  own  merit.  They 
do  not  iief^d  redemption. 

Our  silver  dollars,  however,  must  all  be  redeemed  sooner  or  later  and 
taken  oft"  the  shoulders  of  Uncle  Sam.  This  w^ould  be  comparatively 
easy,  however,  if  we  adopted  a  standard  silver  coin  of  silver  as  silver 
w^ould  go  into  actual  use  as  money  and  immediately  begin  to  rise  in 
value  as  compared  with  gold.  Uncle  Sam  would  thereby  acquire  a  safe 
and  inexhaustible  output  for  the  silver  that  now  troubles  him  so.  lie 
would  also  quit  "buying  silver"  with  gold  which  would  be  a  great  relief 
to  him.  The  adoption  of  this  plan  would  not  "drive  gold  out  of  the 
country  for  there  is  no  legal  tender  fraud  in  this  nor  legislation  inimi- 
cal to  gold  as  a  money  metal.  On  the  contrary  it  is  simply  fair  play  and 
and  even  justice,  (iold  would  not  "leave  tiie  country"  on  the  contrarv, 
it  would  be  smoked  out  of  the  vaults  and  strongholds  where  it  is  doing 
no  good  to  itself  nor  anybody  else  Hud  come  smilingly  forth  to  ask, 
"what  can  1  do  for  you  today  V"  But  before  speculating  upon  the  con- 
sequences or  indicating  the  result  we  will  give  the  present  laws  of  the 
United  States  government  on  the  subject  of  coinage  and  money. 

COINAGE   LAWS,   ETC. 

The  laws  governing  the  coinage  today  are  as  follows— Section  2518 
of  the  Revised  Statutes  of  the  United  States,  under  weights  and  meas- 
ures, says  : 

"The  silver  coins  of  the  United  States  shall  be  a  trade  dollar,  a  half 
dollar  or  tifty  cent  piece,  a  quarter  dollar  or  twenty-live  cent  piece,  a 
dime  or  ten  cent  piece.  The  weight  of  the  trade  dollar  shall  be  420 grains 
troy.  The  weight  of  the  half  dollar  shall  be  twelve  grammes  and  one-half 
gramme.  The  quarter  dollar  and  dime  shall  be  respectively  one-half 
and  oue-lifth  the  weight  of  said  half  dollar." 

They  are  all  by  regulation  9-10  fine. 

Section  811  says:  "The  gold  coins  of  the  United  States  shall  be  a 
one  dollar   piece,   which  at  the  standard  weight  of  25.8  grains  shall  be 


TilK   ALrilA   OF   MONEY.  17 

the  unit  of  value,  a  quarter  Eagle  or  two  and  one-half  dollar  piece,  a 
three  dollar  piece,  and  a  double  Eagle  or  twenty  dollar  piece."  The 
article  then  goes  on  to  give  the  weight  of  these  pieces,  all  exact  multiples 
of  the  weight  of  the  dollar  piece.  No  Uylit  coins  here.  It  is  very  clear 
that  we  are  on  the  Gold  basis,  and  our  "unit  of  value"  or  dollar  is  the  gold 
dollar  and  the  money  of  the  United  States  of  25.8  grains  of  standard 
gold  i)-IO  tine  and  containing  23.22  grains  of  pure  gold. 

The  above  laws  were  enacted  ill  1873.  The  law  of  1878  providing 
for  the  coinage  of  the  ''dohar  of  our  dads"  is  as  follows: 

"He  it  enacted,  etc."  "that  there  shall  be  coined  at  the  several  mints 
of  the  United  States,  silver  dollars  of  the  weight  of  412-5  grains  troy  of 
standard  silver  9-10  line,  as  provided  in  the  act  of  January  18,  1837,  on 
which  shall  be  the  devices  and  superscriptions  provided  by  such  act, 
which  coins,  together  with  all  silver  dollars  heretofore  coined  in  the 
United  States  of  like  weight  and  tineness.  shall  be  legal  tender  at  their 
nominal  value  for  all  dues,  both  public  and  private,  except  where  other- 
wise expressly  stipulated  in  the  contract." 

A  gramme  contains  15.432  grains  and  12i^  grammes  is  the  weight  of 
our  half  dollar.  The  "subsidiary"  dollar  piece,  were  it  coined,  would 
weigh  385.8  grains,  and  be  25  grammes  of  silver  9-10  fine  and  it  would 
contain  347.22  grains  of  pure  silver.  Our  subsidiary  coins  are  therefore, 
24.03  grains  of  pure  silver  lighter  for  every  "dollar"  coined  as  compared 
with  "the  dollar  of  our  dads." 

Tliis  as  we  said  before  is  not  of  much  importance  to  a  holder  of  a 
token  coin,  "dollar,"  for  if  Uncle  Sam  is  "good"  he  gets  his  gold  dollar 
for  it.  If  by  any  possible  inadvertence  Uncle  Sam  should  put  more 
silver  in  it  than  can  be  bought  in  some  market  for  the  25.8  grains  of 
United  States  standard  gold  which  it  represents,  then  the  fellow  would 
take  it  there  and  make  his  profit,  and  probably  relieve  our  paternal  Uncle 
of  the  necessity  of  redeeming  it,  as  it  would  probably  be  melted  and 
worked  up  into  some  other  brand  of  silver  goods.  The  game  is  always 
heads  I  win,  and  tails  you  loose,  against  our  unsophisticated  country 
uncle-  This  thing  has  been  done  before,  and  our  Uncle  then  invented 
the  "subsidiary"  half  dollar  and  other  coins  in  his  laudable  but  mistaken 
efforts  to  make  the  bread  of  his  nephews  square  with  their  cheese.  Why 
did  he  not  make  his  gold  dollar  smaller?  I  suppose  thai  he  thought  its 
size  was  already  small  enough. 

We  will  leave  the  question  to  "alternative  standard"  men,  but  more 
especially  to  the  "bimetallic"  people  who  never  seem  to  understand 
where  the  belt  slips  in  the  machinery  of  their  argument.  It  would  be 
well  for  them  to  study  the  matter  over  before  their  champions 
be  impaled  upon  the  lance  of  John  Sherman  or  Mr.  Gladstone, 
those  veteran  warriors  in  the  unholy  cause  of  the  single  gold  stand- 
ard. Such  Philistines  will  never  be  killed  by  the  "jaw  bone  of  an  ass." 
They  are  using  every  wile,  unconsciou.sly  it  may  be,  whereby  the  Samson 
of  labor  may  be  shorn  through  the  blandishment  of  the  sweet  spoken 
Delilah  of  "tlie  single  gold  standard,',  and  they  are  likely  yet  to  succeed. 
If  they  do  the  temple  of  Government  will  come  down  in  a  wreck,  bury- 
ing Samson  and  his  enemies  in  one  universal  crash.  It  may  be,  however, 
that  they  would  not  object  to  the  plan  proposed  here.  If  so,  they  would 
be  extremely  valuable  nllies. 

The  light  half  dollar  was  invented  a  long  time  ago,  and  right  here 
entered  the  wedge  that  led  to  the  demonetization  of  silver,  for  here  the 
old  "Alternative  Standard"  was  broken  by  Government  itself.  The  \2% 
gramme  half  dollar  mentioned  above  is  not  of  the  same  weight  as  our 
ola  half  dollar,  it  was  made  to  weigh  12^^  grammes  in  latter  days  to  get 
on  a  sort  of  weight  relationship  with  the  French  five  franc  piece  of  25 
grammes.  This  sounds  very  nice  to  the  ear,  but  it  "breaks  to  the  sense," 
for  there  was  no  earthly  iise  in  a  United  States  token  coin  that  would 
not  pass  current  in  France.  If  ever  used  there  it  would  be  bought  by 
weight  for  the  French  mint  and  coined  into  French  coins. 

Before  proceeding  further  to  condemn  the  faults  of  our  present 
system,  we  will  show  what  we  think  ought  to  be  done  and  what  laws 
should  be  therefore  enacted.  Our  task  is  a  great  one  for  we  have  not 
only  to  invent  and  adopt  a  correct  coinage  system  for  the  United  States, 
but  also  to  get  that  Government  honorably  out  of  the  entanglements  of 
the  old  dollar  system. 

We  propose  the  following  legislation  for  that  purpose : 


lii  Till::   AJLl'llA    OF   MOMEY. 

PROPOSED  GENERAL   LEGISLATION,  ETC. 

"Be  it  enacted,  etc." 

Section  1.  That  the  basis  weights  of  the  coinage  system  of  the 
United  States  shall  be  a  "mint  weight  of  4UU  grains  troy  of  pure  metal 
or  substance  ;  the  "'karat"  which  shall  be  the  1-lUUth  part  of  the  mint- 
weight  and  consist  or  four  grains  of  the  same,  and  the  grain  which  shall 
be  tne  troy  grain. 

Sec.  2.  The  gold  coins  of  the  United  States  to  be  hereafter  coined 
shall  be  an  "orenL"  and  shall  contain  one  miutweight  or  40u  grains  or  lUO 
karats  of  pure  gold.  If  made  of  the  present  United  States  standard  or 
coinage  gold,  900  tine,  it  must  weigh  444  4-9  grains.  The  1-100  part  of  an 
Orent  shall  be  called  an  "Orat"  and  shall  contain  one  karat  or  four 
grains  of  pure  gold.  Besides  the  orent  there  shall  also  be  coined  the  % 
orent  or  50  orat  piece,  tlie  34  orent  or  25  orat  piece,  the  1-10  orent  or  ten  orat 
piece,  and  the  1-20  orent  or  hve  orat  piece,  to  be  ail  of  the  tineness  of  the 
orent,  and  to  be  V3,  ^4, 1-10  and  1-20  of  the  weight  of  the  orent  respectively, 
and  respectfully  tney  shall  contain  titty  karats  or  200  grains  of  pure  gold, 
twenty  tive  karats  or  100  grains  of  pure  gold,  ten  karats  or  forty  grains 
of  pure  gold,  and  tive  karats  or  twenty  grains  of  pure  gold. 

There  shall  be  inscribed  on  all  United  States  coins  the  letter  indi- 
cating the  mint  where  coined  and  the  tigures  indicating  the  date  of 
coinage.  The  abbreviation  for  the  word  orent  used  by  the  United  States 
Government  shall  be  writen  "O"  in  the  center  of  which  a  dot  may  be 
placed,  if  necessary,  to  distinguish  it  from  the  sign  for  zero,  or  any 
other.  The  abreviation  likewise  used  for  the  word  orat  may  be  written 
"Ot."  and  for  Karat  "K." 

There  shall  also  be  inscribed  on  the  orent  on  one  side  "One  Orent, 
U^.  S.  of  America  100  Orats"  and  upon  the  other  "900  U.  loo  Kaiats 
Gold."  Upon  the  %  Orent  "%  Orent  U.  S.  of  A..  50  Orats"  on  one  side 
and  upon  the  other  "900  F.  50  K,  G."  Upon  the  14  Orent  "^4  Orent  U.  S. 
A.  25  Orats,"  on  one  side  and  on  the  other  ".900  i^ .  25  K,  G."  Upon  the 
I-IO  Orent,  "1-10  O.  U.  S.  10  Ot."  upon  one  side,  and  on  the  other  "900  F. 
10  K,  G."  Upon  the  1-20  Orent  "1-20  O.  U.  S.  5  Ot."  on  one  side  and  on 
the  other  ".900  5  K.  G. 

Sec.  3.  The  standard  silver  coins  shall  be  an  "Argent"  and  shall 
contain  \i\\^  "mint-weight"  or  100  karats  or  400  grains  Troy  of  pure  sil- 
ver, and  if  made  of  the  standard  or  coinage  silver  of  the  United  States 
at  present  used,  which  is  .900  tine,  it  must  weigh  444  4-9  grains.  The 
one  hundreth  part  of  an  "Argent"  shall  be  called  an  "Argat"  and  shall 
contain  one  karat  or  four  grains  of  pure  silver. 

The  abbreviation  for  "Argent"  shall  be  written  "A,"  the  tirst  letter 
of  the  alphabet,  and  when  necessary  to  particularly  distinguish  it,  a  dot 
may  be  placed  in  the  triangle  between  tlie  bar  and  the  top  of  the  "A." 
The  abbreviatioii  for  Argat  may  be  written  At. 

There  shall  also  be  coined  the  Y^,  Argent  or  50  Argat  piece;  the  34  Ar- 
gent or  25  Argat  piece;  the  1-10  Argent  or  10  Argat  piece;  the  1-20  Argent 
or  5  Argat  piece;  all  to  be  of  the  tineness  of  the  Argent,  but  respectively  of 
1-2,  1-4,  1-10  and  l-20th  the  weight  thereof,  and  they  shall  respectively 
contain  50  Karats  or  200  grains  of  pure  silver;  25  Karats  or  100  grains  of 
pure  silver;  10  Karats  or  40  grains  of  pure  silver;  5  Karats  or  20  grains 
of  pure  silver.  The  inscription  on  tiiese  silver  coins  shall  be  the  same 
as  those  upon  the  corresponding  gold  coins  with  the  appropriate  substi- 
tution of  the  words  Argent  aud  Argat  or  their  signs,  for  the  words 
Orent  and  Orat  or  their  signs. 

Sec.  4.  The  token  coins  for  gold  shall  be  of  the  diameter  of  the  25 
Orat  piece  but  of  twice  the  thickness,  and  composed  of  such  alloy  of 
nickel  as  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  may  consider  suitable.  They 
shall  have  impressed  on  one  side,  the  words  "United  States  token,"  with 
the  mint  letter  and  date;  and  on  the  other  side,  "For  one  Orat,"  or  "For 
Two,"  "Three,"  or  "Four  Orats,"  etc.,  as  the  case  may  be,  but  none  shall 
be  made  representing  more  than  4  Orats,  as  we  have  the  5  Orat  standard 
coin  for  sums  above  4  Orats.  The  token  coins  for  silver  shall  be  of  the 
diameter  of  the  25  Argat  piece,  but  of  twice  its  thickness.  It  shall  be 
made  of  copper  or  some  convenient  alloy  thereof  to  be  selected  by  th^^ 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury.  It  shall  have  impressed  upon  one  side,  the 
mint  letter  and  date,  and  the  words  "United  States  Token,"  and  upon 
the  other  side  "For  One  Argat,"  or  "For  Two,"  "Three,"  or  "Four  Argats," 
according  to  the  number  of  Argats,  or  the  fraction  thereof  which  it 


Till!:   ALPHA   OF   MONEY.  19 

is  intended  to  represent,  but  none  shall  be  made  for  more  than  4  Argats. 
as  we  have  the  silver  5  x\.rgat  standard  piece  for  that  purpose. 

Sec.  5.  The  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  is  hereby  authorized  and 
directed  to  carefully  select  such  other  designs,  superscriptions,  etc.,  for 
the  various  coins  heretofore  mentioned  in  tliis  act,  as  he  may  in  his 
judgment  consider  useful,  elegant  and  appropriate,  and  is  hereby  author- 
ized to  select  a  committee  of  experts  or  take  any  such  action  as  in  his 
judgment  will  assist  him  in  that  purpose,  and  such  designs,  etc.,  are  to 
be  submitted  to  the  President  of  the  United  States,  for  his  approval, 
and  wlien  so  approved  are  hereby  ordered  to  be  adopted. 

Sec.  ().  ff  platinum  or  any  other  valuable  metal,  hereafter  be 
coined  into  standard  coins  of  the  United  States,  it  shall  be  coined  ac- 
cording to  the  system  outlined  in  this  act,  and  the  standard  platinum 
coin  containing  100  Karats  of  platinum,  shall  be  called  a  "Platent,"  and 
the  one-hundredth  part  thereof  shall  be  called  a  '-riat."  The  alloy  of 
which  this  shall  be  made  shall  be  subject  to  the  discretion  of  the  Secre- 
tary of  the  Treasury  and  approval  of  the  President,  who  may  adopt 
such  abbreviations  for  the  word  Piatent  and  Plat  as  they  may  thinX 
expedient,  and  may  order  the  coinage  of  platinum  if  presented  for 
mintage  in  sums  aggregating  1000  pounds  troy,  and  shall  do  so  if  these 
sums  aggregate  to  what  they  may  consider  a  sufficient  amount.  They 
are  also  empowered  to  select  appropriate  United  States  tokens  for  plati- 
num, accord  pig  to  the  rule  heretofore  laid  down  in  case  platinum  be 
coined.  And  the  same  rule  applies  to  any  other  metal  which  they  may 
consider  advisable  to  coin. 

Sec.  7.  The  token  coins  of  the  U.  S.  for  Orats,  Argats,  etc,,  will  be 
redeemed  upon  demand  at  the  U.  S.  treasury,  in  sums  representing  five 
oa  any  multiple  thereof,  and  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  is  hereby 
particularly  comniauckd  never,  upon  any  account,  to  place  such  coins 
into  circulation,  except  as  againsc  the  amount  or  quantity  of  metal 
which  they  represent  actually  on  deposit  in  full  in  the  U.  S.  treasury, 
which  amounts  or  quantities  are  to  be  held  inviolably  sacred  for  the 
snecitic  purpose  of  their  redemption. 

Sec.  8.  The  legal  tender  laws  of  the  U.  S.  are  hereby  abolished  ex- 
cepting in  so  far  as  they  subsist  between  the  gold  dollar  and  its  repre- 
sentative, whose  nominal  value  the  U.  S.  hereby  solemnly  pledges  itself 
to  protect,  by  every  just  and  honorable  means  in  its  power. 

Sec.  y.  The  legal  tender  notes  knoWn  as  greenbacks  are  hereby  con- 
verted into  bonds,  subject  to  the  call  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury 
and  drawing  interest  at  the  rate  of  tlu'ee  per  cent,  per  annum  from  the 
date  of  the  pjissjige  of  this  act.  These  calls  may  be  either  made  by 
numbers  or  by  denominations,  or  both,  in  such  manner  as  the  Secretary 
of  the  Treasury  may  consider  advisable,  and  when  so  called,  interest 
upon  such  will  be  stopped  and  they  will  be  paid  or  redeemed,  and 
when  so  redeemed  will  be  carefully  destroyed,  after  being  care- 
fully counted  and  recorded,  and  upon  no  account  will  the  same 
be  reissued.  The  gold  fund  now  held  in  the  treasury  for  the  pro- 
tection of  greenbacks  shall  be  used  for  the  protectipn  of  the  silver 
"dollars"  and  subsidiary  coins  at  their  nominal  value  and  whenever  they 
be  exchanged  at  the  United  States  treasury  for  gold  they  will  not  be 
again  issued  but  will  be  converted  into  the  coins  of  the  "Argent"  and  its 
submultiples.  And  it  is  hereby  declared  to  be  the  policy  of  the  United 
States  government  to  retire  the  silver  representatives  of  the  dollars  as 
fast  as  possible  or  practicable  and  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  is  pos- 
itively hereby  directed  so  to  do.  This  rule  of  redemption  applies 
in  the  same  degree  to  the  nickel  live  and  the  copper  one  cent  pieces  at 
their  nominal  value.  P>ut  the  gold  dollar  and  its  silver  representatives 
will  be  used  inter-changeably  by  the  United  States  Government  at 
its  convenience,  except  in  payments  where  it  is  expressly  specitied  that 
gold  only  shall  be  paid.  This,  however,  does  not  interfere  with  the 
policy  of  ultimately  redeeming  every  representative  dollar  in  gold  as 
rapidly  as  possible. 

Sec.  10.  The  United  States  at  its  various  custom-houses  and  other 
offices,  will  still  collect  dues  in  dollars  under  its  present  laws,  but  if 
new  laws  be  made  the  dues  siiall  be  expressed  in  "Orats"  and  "Orents," 
but  collected  in  Orents  or  Orats  or  their  equivalents  in  dollars,  and  5.805 
Orats  may  be  the  equivalent  of  one  dollar.  This  is  the  result  obtained 
by  dividing  the  23.22  grains  of  pure  gold  in  the  dollar  by  four,  or  the 
number  of  grains  of  pure  gold  in  the  "Orat." 


20  TllK   Al^rilA    OF    MOiNEY. 

Sec.  11.  The  indebtedness  of  the  United  States  are  payable  in  dol- 
lars, but  the  United  States  declares  its  indebtedness  to  be  fairly  and 
honorably  discharged  by  the  payment  of  5,805  Orats,  or  58.05  Orents,  or 
58  (Jreiits  and  5  orats  for  every  thousand  dollars  of  indebtedness  pay- 
able in  giAd  dollars,  and  smaller  sums  in  the  same  proportion,  as  that  is 
the  exact  quantity  of  gold  in  one  thousand  gold  dollars,  and  the  gold 
dollar  of  28  and  5-10  grains  of  U.  S.  standard  gold  9-10  line  and  which 
contains  23  and  22-100  grains  was  declares  to  be  the  dollar  and  the  "unit 
of  value"  ot  the  United  States  and  is  the  "basis"  of  the  dollar  system  of 
coinage,  all  other  dollars  under  said  system  being  merely  representative 
of  the  gold  dollar. 

The  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  will  make  payments  of  said  indebted- 
ness of  the  United  States  expressed  in  dollars  only,  either  in  dollars  or 
Orents  and  in  said  ratio  at  his  option.  The  (xovernment  will  also  receive 
payments  at  the  same  ratio,  that  is,  5.805  Orats  for  one  dollar  and  vice 
versa;  but  for  the  future  transactions  of  the  United  States  the  Secretary 
of  the  Treasury  may  fix  the  ratio  at  5.8  Orats  for  one  dollar,  which,  if  he 
dees,  he  must  publish  in  every  postolfice  of  the  United  States  and  said  ratio 
will  not  be  subject  to  change  except  by  spacial  act  of  Congress  and 
never  retroactive. 

Sec  12.  The  revenue  of  the  United  States  will  be  receivable  in  gold  as 
the  Government  of  the  United  States  nef^ds  gold  in  its  business.  ]5ut 
hereafter  when  it  becomes  advisable,  the  Government,  at  the  option  of 
the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  may  receive  payment  in  silver  at  a  ratio 
with  gold  to  be  fixed  by  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  as  hereafter  ex- 
plained. 

Sec.  13.  Salaries  of  all  offices  of  the  Government,  all  pension  dues, 
or  appropriations,  claims  or  rewards,  or  other  expenses  expressed  in 
dollars,  will  be  paid  either  in  gold  dollars  or  its  representatives  or  stand- 
ard Orents  and  Orats,  as  indicated  before  in  this  act,  or  in  Argents  and 
Argats,  but  if  paid  for  in  these  standard  coins  of  silver,  it  will  be  at  a 
ratio  fixed  every  six  months  by  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  which 
ratio  shall  be  as  near  as  possible  to  the  average  price  or  exchange  rate  of 
silver  as  compared  with  gold.  This  is  hereby  declared  to  be  the  policy 
of  the  United  States  with  reference  to  all  dues  owing  by  it,  whether  ex- 
pressed in  Orents  or  Argents,  unless  it  shall  be  expressly  stipulated  that 
such  dues  shall  be  paid  in  one  metal  only.  This  is  done  in  order  to  pro- 
tect the  Government  in  case  of  a  "gold  famine"  or  a  "silver  famine." 
This  rule  only  applies  to  the  transactions  of  the  Government  with  per- 
sons or  associations  doing  business  with  it.  It  shall  be  the  policy  of  the 
Government  to  retain  this  option  as  frequently  as  possible  and  the 
above  mentioned  dues  may  be  paid  in  whole  or  in  part  in  the  manner 
above  indicated. 

Sec.  14.  The  United  States  Government  hereby  declares  that  there 
is  no  such  thing  within  these  United  States  as  a  specially  and  legally 
recognized  special  "unit  of  value"  or  money  to  be  specially  protected  by 
Government,  and  individuals  and  commerce  of  any  particular  place  in 
the  United  States  are  left  free  to  select  the  money  or  "uni:  of  value,"  or 
price  standard  that  may  please,  and  no  general  laws  on  the  subject  are 
considered  advisable,  it  being  recognized  that  debts  are  but  contracts  for 
the  performance  of  some  obligation  which  obligation  should  be  clearly 
understood  by  both  parties  and  when  written  should  clearly  and  ex- 
plicitly expressed.  The  National  Hanking  laws  relating  to  the  estab- 
lishment of  new  National  Banks  are  hereby  abolished.  But  that  part 
of  such  laws  as  may  effect  contracts  already  made,  or  obligations  as- 
sumed by  the  United  States  Government  still  remains  in  force,  as  well 
as  that  part  relating  to  the  conversion  of  National  Banks  into  Private 
Banks,  but  no  Private  Bank  shall  hereafter  be  converted  into  National 
Bank. 

Sec.  15  No  more  silver  dollar  notes  will  be  issued  but  those  issued 
already  will  be  honored  according  to  the  terms  thereof,  and  the  law  as 
to  the  buying  of  silver  and  the  issuance  of  silver  dollar  notes  is  hereby 
abolished. 

Sec.  16.  If  gold  Orent  and  Orat  notes  and  silver  Argent  and  Argat 
notes  be  issued  by  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  which  may  be  done  if 
he  thinks  it  convenient,  advisable  or  good  public  policy,  it  shall  be  done 
upon  and  against  a  full  amount  of  gold  or  silver,  as  the  case  may  be, 
actually  deposited,  and  a  department  of  the  Treasury  known  as  the  De- 


TllK   ALi'HA   OF   MO^'EY.  20 

posit  Department,  will  then  be  formed  by  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury, 
and  these  notes  will  be  issued  by  the  Treasury  against  amounts  actually 
deposited,  which  shall  be  the  amounts  named  in  the  notes,  and  the 
Secretary  of  tlie  Treasury  is  hereby  commanded  never  to  issae  such 
notes  under  any  other  condition,  and  these  deposits  are  in  no  wise  to  be 
considered  as  the  property  of  the  United  States  Government  and  are  to 
be  held  inviolably  sacred  and  only  for  the  payment,  redemptson  or  justi- 
fication of  said  notes.  This  same  rule  applies  to  any  other  money  metal 
that  ever  may  be  coined  by  the  United  Slates. 

The  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  may  or  may  not  charge  warehouseage 
for  this  favor  for  it  is  not  a  part  of  the  necessary  business  of  the  United 
States  treasury.  The  designs,  etc.,  for  said  notes  shall  be  selected  by  the 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury  subject  to  the  approval  of  the  President  of 
the  United  States. 

If  warehousage  be  charged  it  shall  be  collected  in  advance  for  a 
dehnite  lenirth  of  time  stated  upon  the  note,  which  shall  also  be  stamped 
with  the  date  of  issuance,  and  if  the  time  overruns  before  the  note 
should  be  presented  for  payment  then  the  warehousage  becomes  a  charge 
at  a  hxed  rate  upon  said  deposit  and  collectable  therefrom,  and  the  busi- 
ness is  to  be  managed  with  scrupulous  exactness  and  accounts  kept  with 
absolute  correctness  as  a  warehouse  business;  but  the  Secretary  is  not 
obliged  to  receive  metal  and  issue  notes  except  he  consider  it  advisable. 
No  more  gold  dollar  notes  will  be  issued,  but  if  Orent  and  Orat  notes 
be  issued  as  above  indicated,  then  gold  dollars  may  be  taken  for  that 
purpose  at  the  above  rate  of  5.805  Orats  for  every  25.8  grains^of  standard 
gold  of  said  coinage  received  for  deposit.  This  rule  or  ratio  will  never 
vary  and  it  is  not  in  the  power  of  the  Secretary  to  change  it  as  regards 
deposit  notes,  as  the  United  States  in  this  case  must  honestly  receive 
what  it  accounts  for  and  honestly  account  for  what  it  receives. 

Sec.  18.  Wlien  the  time  comes  that  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury 
has  on  hand  a  surplus  of  gold  for  the  redemption  of  silyer  dollars  and 
other  representative  coins  and  cannot  obtain  them  through  the  custom 
houses  or  other  channels  of  the  business  of  the  United  States  he  is 
hereby  empowered  to  call  them  for  redemption  and  for  that  purpose 
may  call  them  by  the  dates  of  their  issuance  from  the  mint  or  their 
mintage  or  coinage  date.  Each  call  will  last  for  six  months  and  all  such 
silver  dollars  will  be  paid  for  or  redeemed  at  their  nominal  value  of  5.805 
Orals  to  the  dollar,  but  if  not  presented  within  those  six  months  the 
Secretary  will  no  longer  honor  them  at  their  nominal  value  and  they 
will  be  treated  by  the  United  States  (Government  as  silver  bullion  and 
considered  as  such.  Wlien  the  calls  are  made  by  the  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury  he  is  hereby  directed  to  carefully  have  explicit  notices  of  the 
same  posted  in  every  Government  office  of  the  United  States,  and  es- 
pecially and  prominently  in  every  Post-Office,  Custom  House  and  for- 
eign office  of  the  United  States  during  the  whole  of  the  six  months  for 
which  said  call  lasts. 

To  the  objector  as  the  summary  manner  in  which  legal  tender  notes 
would  be  thus  converted  into  bonds,  we  will  say  that  it  is  nothing  like  as 
arbitrary  a  proceeding  as  that  which  lirst  made  them  legal  tender  for  the 
dollars  of  the  United  States.  The  plan  has  the  great  merit  of  taking 
the  danger  of  a  rush  on  the  gold  reserves  away  and  of  giving  the  Secre- 
tary abundant  time  to  carry  on  his  financial  affairs  calmly,  deliberately 
and  in  a  sensible  manner.  He  takes  the  gold  funds  and  immediately 
strengthens  the  old  silver  representative  dollar  beyond  all  risk. 

People  are  very  much  like  the  man  who  wanted  his  money  if  the 
bank  did  not  have  it  and  did  not  want  it  if  they  did  have  it.  He*  never- 
theless, relentlessly  pursues  the  policy  of  redeeming  the  silver  represent- 
ative of  the  dollar.  He  has  an  inexhaustible  output  for  silver  and  the 
Treasury  cannot  be  gorged  with  innegotiable  representative  coins  nor 
terrified  by  anybody.  It  would  not  therefore  be  under  the  necessity  of 
keeping  large  reserves  of  the  peoples  money  lying  idle  in  the  Treasury 
for  the  unique  purpose  of  sustaining  an  unnatural  and  unreasonable 
system  of  finance. 

Silver  would  no  doubt  go  into  immediate  use  as  money  in  a  great 
part  of  the  country  and  the  awful  strain  on  the  "gold  basis"  would  at 
once  be  relaxed  as  silver  coming  into  actual  use  would  be  in  demand 
and  no  longer  a  drug  on  the  market  and  a  slave  to  the  behests  of  any 
gold  conspiracy  that  could  possibly  be  formed,  as  it  would  immediately 
be  on  a  rising  market  with  gold.     It  would  be  bought  with  gold  or  ex- 


22  THE    ALl'llA    OF    MONEi'. 

changed  therefor  in  enormous  quantities  making  gold  "plenty"  which 
would  be  what  is  positively  needed.  It  is  no  conspiracy  against  gold 
nor  anything  else  for  it  treats  gold  on  fair  and  equal  terms. 

Another  plan  which  has  a  precedent  might  be  formed  which  would 
be  no  more  than  turning  the  same  tables  against  gold.  This  plan  would 
be  to  coin  this  new  standard  coin  of  silver,  call  it  an  argent  as  above,  de- 
clare it  to  be  the  legal  tender  for  all  debts  both  public  and  private,  to  be 
in  the  future  contracted  in  the  United  states  and  say  that  it  was  the 
"unit  of  value"  as  positively  prescribed  by  the  United  IStates  government 
for  the  United  States,  collect  dues  in  gold,  pay  all  salaries  in  silver,  pay 
up  the  dollar  gold  debts,  redeem  the  old  dollars  of  silver  in  gold,  and  put 
the  country  altogether  upon  a  "silver  basis."  The  gold  men  would  stand 
aghast  at  this  but  it  be  just  exactly  what  was  done  for  gold  except  in  the 
matter  of  token  coinage  which  was  a  still  greater  advantage  for  gold. 
This  plan  would  only  be  to  pat  the  shoe  fairly  on  the  other  foot. 

The  plan  of  some  of  our  silver  men,  as  I  understand  it,  is  to  make 
the  "dollar  of  our  dads"  legal  tender  for  all  debts  both  public  and  private, 
that  is  in  elTect  to  put  the  country  on  the  "silver  dollar"  as  the  "unit  of 
value"  and  also  [  understand  it  to  pay  otf  its  debts  contracted  in  dollars 
with  it.  I'hat  would  mean  to  make  the  silver  dollar  of  412i^  grains  con 
tainining  371.25  grains  a  standard  coin  and  the  "unit  of  value"  or  the 
dollar  of  the  country  instead  of  the  gold  dollar  of  25.8  grains  of  standard 
gold  containing  23.22  grains  of  pure  gold  and  pay  debts  contracted  to  be 
paid  in  the  gold  dollar  with  it  as  well  as  all  other  debts  of  every  kind 
payable  in  dollars. 

Chis  is  not  fulfilling  the  terms  of  their  contract  and  would  be  pay- 
ing in  one  thing  instead  of  in  another  thing  contracted  to  be  paid  or  de- 
livered, it  would  be  a  living  lie  under  the  "parity"  system  and  a  fraud 
upjn  mankind.  It  would  be  an  arbitrary,  not  to  say  dishonorable  .^pro- 
ceeding, even  if  it  was  not  called  repudiation,  which  in  effect  it  would 
be.     It  would  be  governmental  lying  and  national  theft. 

The  plan  here  advotated  however  is  of  no  such  unfair  and  arbitrary 
nature.  It  simply  does  exact  justice,  complies  religiously  with  every  ob- 
ligation and  settles  the  monetary  and  coinage  question  forever  and  set- 
tles it  right.  This  article  .however,  has  to  do  particularly  with  the  coin- 
agf»  system  and  can  not  discuss  all  the  sections  of  the  law  above.  It 
will  deal  especially  onlv  with  those  concerning  coinage,  for  the  others 
are  but  necessary  consequences  that  would  naturally  follow  from  the 
idea  of  money  which  has  been  Inculcated  in  this  essay. 

In  the  question  of  coinage  and  money  the  United  States  Govern- 
ment must  be  regarded  as  a  business  association  or  rather  agency,  acting 
honorably  for  the  interests  of  the  whole  people,  It  is  therefore  no  part 
of  its  business  to  try  to  escape  by  any  Jinesse  or  chicanery  from  their 
solemnly  contracted  obligations. 

It  will  be  noticed  that  no  provision  has  been  made  for  the  issuance 
of  paper  representative  legal  tender  money,  and  no  paper  representative 
money  is  issued  by  the  Government,  except  as  against  its  original  on 
deposit  in  full. 

This  honorable  Government  needs  neither  to  be  a  beggar  in  the 
money  market  nor  a  brutal  and  ignorant  dupe  in  the  money  trade.  There 
is  also  no  more  reason  why  they  should  issue  certificates  for  more  gold 
or  silver  than  they  have  in  the  Treasury  than  they  should  issue  certifi- 
cates for  more  whiskey,  tobacco  or  wheat  than  they  have  of  the  same  in 
their  warehouses.  It  would  always  be  a  lie  and  a  fraud  only  harmful 
and  dishonorable  and  costly  to  themselves,  or  rather  to  the  people  of  the 
United  States  which  the  Government  in  this  matter  represents.  It  is 
also  no  part  of  its  business  to  lend  their  "credit"  to  any  association  of 
men,  or  to  any  business  in  such  manner  as  to  give  such  business  advan- 
tage over  the  rest  of  the  commonwealth,  or  to  give  such  any  valuable 
privileges  at  the  expense  and  to  the  prejudice  of  the  rest  of  the 
people.  The  Government  is  no  "crib"  even  for  the  large  part  of  the  peo- 
ple, when  that  crib  has  to  be  filled  at  the  expei.se  of  the  rest  withont 
fair  assistance  and  reciprocity  from  the  first. 

In  the  money  market  the  Unit»^d  States  has  appeared  as  an  immense 
borrower  with  enormous  resources  of  many  kinds,  but  principally  in 
the  way  of  taxes,  which  are  taken  from  the  sweat  of  American  labor, 
and  can  be  taken  in  no  other  way.  They  simply  represent  the  blood  of 
the  toiling  millions,  the  industry  of  our  brethren,  patient,  patriotic, 
humble  and  noble.    All  that  the  government  has  to  do  now  is  to  pay  its 


TllJi   ALtllA   OF   MONEY.  23 

debts  as  rapidly  as  possible.  The  quicker  and  more  economically  that 
they  honorably  do  it  the  better,  for  a  national  debt  is  no  national  bless- 
ing—it is  a  national  leech,  or  rather  transcendent  transfusionist,  which 
generally  takes  the  blood  from  the  weaker  subject  to  engorge  or  congest 
the  more  robust  one;  a  proceeding  not  at  ail  conducive  to  the  true 
wealth  or  health  of  the  nation.  The  task  of  payment  is  simple  and 
easy  to  be  understood.  Gigantic  howsoever  it  may  be,  the  only  '"•credit" 
it  has  anything  do  with  is  their  own  ability  and  willingness  to  pay,  there- 
fore, no  reserves  should  be  allowed  to  pile  up  in  the  treasury  but  should 
be  applied  to  debt  of  every  kind  and  nothing  should  be  squandered.  But 
this  article  has  particularly  to  do  only  with  coinage. 

It  will  be  noticed  that  our  token  coins  for  any  particular  metal  are 
all  of  one  size  and  composition,  which  is  exactly  as  it  should  be,  as  it  is 
the  promise  that  makes  them  good,  not  the  metal  in  them,  just  as  you 
use  the  same  quality  and  size  of  paper  for  a  $100  note  that  you  do  for 
one  of  $1,000,  though  the  writing  or  promise  must  be  different.  These 
token  coins  may  have  different  designs  besides  the  printing  to  show 
this,  thus  a  single  bar  across  might  mean  ''one,"  two  bars  "two,"  and  so 
on,  for  the  convenience  of  quick  reading;  or  the  one  for  "three  might 
be  an  equalateral  triangle,  and  for  "four"  a  square,  for  the  benefit,  per- 
haps, of  the  unlettered. 

PARTIAL   REVIEW,   ETC. 

Among  the  principal  points  that  we  have  shown  in  this  essay  are 
the  following: 

1.  That  we  are  in  need  of  a  standard  coin  of  silver,  that  is,  one 
that  must  travel  on  its  own  merits,  and  it  is  just  that  such  a  coin  should 
be  minted. 

2.  That  it  should  not  have  the  name  "dollar,"  as  that  is  the  name 
already  appropriated  under  the  present  dollar  system  to  designate  the 
"unit  of  value"  of  25  8  grains  of  coinage  gold;  and  that  it  does  not  need 
to  be  of  the  weight  of  the  silver  coins  already  made  and  called  silver  dol- 
lars, etc.,  as  they  are  merely  representative  of  the  gold  dollar,  and  mean 
nothing  in  particular  as  far  as  silver  money  is  concerned,  and  therefore 
furnish  no  guide. 

3.  That  the  coin  should  be  made  of  a  sensible  number  of  grains,  if 
the  grain  is  to  be  used  at  all  as  a  weight  in  the  coinage. 

4.  That  as  precious  metals  are  all  exchanged  by  weight,  they  shoald 
be  exchanged  by  a  sensible  weight  and  must  therefore  be  treated  alike, 
coined  on  their  own  merits  and  treated  according  to  the  same  law  of 
coinage. 

5.  That  the  method  here  proposed  would  be  easily  understood  by 
the  whole  world. 

6.  No  force  should  be  used,  nor  favoritism  practiced. 

7.  That  a  specially  recognized  "unit  of  value"  is  rank,  arbitrary  and 
unjust  favoritism,  altogether  unwarrantable  under  any  true  conception 
of  commerce. 

8.  That  men  should  be  left  free  to  make  such  contracts  as  are  mu- 
tually agreeable. 

9.  That  silver  thus  treated  would  have  a  fair  opportunity  to  become 
a  money  metal  without  prejudice  to  gold,  and  to  become  capital  or 
stored  energy  or  a  reservoir  of  stored  physical  force. 

10.  That  it  is  no  part  of  the  true  business  of  (lOvernment  to  arbi- 
trarily regulate  the  or  value,  or  price  of  coins  or  metals.  It  should 
allow  its  citizens  to  delve  in  the  mines  only  intiuenced  by  the  laws 
of  trade  which  will  indicate  whether  it  be  profitable  or  not. 

Many  other  poins  might  be  enumerated  but  they  are  all  natural  con- 
sequences of  this  just  and  logical  view  of  money  and  of  coinage,  and 
may  be  easily  formulated  by  the  reader.  We  have  finished  our  argu- 
ment.   Have  we  read  the  riddle  and  read  it  aright? 

GENERAL   REMARKS,   ETC. 

Mankind  mnst  arrive  at  a  proper  solution  of  this  problem  and  an 
equitable  disposition  of  this  question.  When  this  is  done  money  will 
cease  to  be  a  disturbing  and  mysterious  element  in  the  affairs  of  men. 
This  must  be  done  before  any  great  advance  in  commerce,  civilization 
and  human  progress  can  be  made.  When  it  is  done  the  advance  will  be 
rapid  and  astounding.     The  minds  of  men  are  turned  upon  the  subject 


24  Tllli   ALl'llA    OF    MOMKV. 

too  intently  not  at  length  to  discern  the  truth.  Tiie  lamp  ot  reason  will 
not  search  in  vain  through  its  dark  and  mysterious  maze  without 
tinding  tlie  key  to  the  whole  situation,  which,  wlien  discovered 
to  the  world  will  show  that  there  is  nothing  so  very  wonderful  about  it 
after  ail.  Tiiere  mast  be  men  who  underscand  this  mystery  and  know 
how  simple  it  is,  but  have  not  given  their  ideas  to  the  world.  Tliere  may 
be  other  men,  altliough  I  doubt  it,  who  for  private  gain,  try  to  hoodwinK 
and  throw  honest  legislators  away  from  the  truth  uy  specious  sophistry 
and  smooth  platitudes.  1  cannoi  help  buc  turn  again  upon  our  tinkers 
half  dollar.  It  was,  1  believe,  hrst  adopted  after  the  discovery  of  gold  in 
California  and  Australia  in  the  year  1«54  by  the  money  butchers^  of 
the  United  States  Treasury  department. 

VVlien  the  subsidiary  coins  were  reduced  in  weight  and  made  legal 
tender  only  for  sums  not  exceeding  hve  dollars  and  the  full  "dollar  of  our 
dads"  was  no  longer  coined  as  the  silver  in  it  had  become  more  valuable 
than  tlie  gold  in  a  gold  dollar.  In  elfect  it  was  demonetized  and  we 
were  put  on  a  gold  oasis  by  coining  silver  as  a  gold  token.  It  was  done 
so  that  "'silver  would  not  be  driven  out  of  the  country,"  that  is,  should 
not  go  to  a  better  market. 

if  the  proud  ratio  hxmg  or  price  setting  prerogative  of  the  United 
States  had  been  aboli.shed  riglit  here  the  matter  would  have  settled  itself 
at  once,  but  with  a  money  and  coinage  system  of  very  false  nomencla- 
ture and  faulty  weights.  The  fact  is  we  want  the  trade  in  metals  to  be  as 
free  as  air  distributing  itself  by  natural  law  the  world  over  and  carrying 
life  and  warmth  to  every  portion.  There  is  no  sucli  thing  as  "British 
gold"  or  "American  silver."  Silver  is  silver  and  gold  is  gold  the  world 
over. 

We  do  not  want  any  coins  that  are  not  good  enough  to  go  out  of  the 
country.  We  do  not  want  a  system  of  money  and  coinnge  ihat  reserves 
inferior  trash  only  for  home  folks.  We  want  all  our  goJd  and  silver 
coins  to  be  sovereigns  standing  upon  their  inalienable  rights  and  stylish 
enough  to  go  visiting  and  good  enough  for  anybody.  We  do  not  want 
anybody  to  be  forced  to  take  them  and  if  they  do  not,  "]S'obody  asked 
you,  sir,  she  said."  We  want  them  to  be  as  good  in  real  truth  as  vve  say 
they  are.  We  want  them  to  be  as  good  inside  as  they  are  claimed  to  be 
outside.  We  want  their  character  to  be  just  exactly  the  same  as  their 
reputation.  We  do  not  want  any  lying,  any  hypocrisy,  any  deceit  about 
them.  We  want  them  honest,  sensible,  solid,  neat,  active,  pretty  and 
true.  There  is  a  danger  to  which  the  Government  is  always  exposed  un- 
der the  present  dollar  or  "parity  of  value  system." 

There  now  would  be  great  profit  in  making  silver  coins  of  exactly 
the  same  weiglit,  appearance  and  composition  of  the  silver  dollar  now 
made  and  altogether  undetectible  by  any  possible  means.  If  the  silver 
in  a  silver  dollar  were  more  valuable  that  the  gold  in  a  gold  dollar,  as 
has  been  the  case  in  the  early  history  of  the  country,  the  protit  would 
be  in  falsifying  the  United  States  gold  coins  with  exactly  the  same 
amount  of  gold.  These  things  may  have  been  done  or  may  be  done  to  the 
secure  prolit  of  counterfeiting  scoundrels.  Under  the  system  which  we 
have  advocated  this  would  be  impossible.  The  mintweightof  400  grains 
subdivides  beautifully,  relating  itself  perfectly  to  the  ounce  and  grain 
weights  by  which  all  precious  metals  are  bought  and  sold  in  commerce. 
Six'of  our  standard  coins  cointaing  a  mintweight  each  of  pure  metal 
would  always  contain  hve  ounces,  and  one  of  them  S-C)  of  an  ounce  or 
10-12  of  an  ounce.  One  ounce  troy  is  IbO  grains.  Twenty-tive  and 
eight-tenths  grains  of  standard  gold  containing  28.22  grains  of  pure  gold 
relates  itself  to  nothing.  So  with  412  5  grains  standard  silver  containing 
311.25  grains  of  pure  silver.  The  quantities  are  altogether  arbitrary  and 
inconvenient  and  worthless  as  factors  in  any  sensible  system  of  com- 
putation. 

How  many  mintweights  of  silver  any  one  would  have  to  give  for 
one  of  gold  which  he  might  wish  to  possess,  or  how  much  he  should  get 
for  one  he  wished  to  dispose  of  for  silver,  is  a  matter  that  should  be 
none  of  the  business  of  Government  and  should  be  left  entirely  to  trade 
as  are  other  matters  of  the  same  nature.  The  Government  never  thinks 
of  lixing  bhe  price  of  wheat  as  compared  with  barely  or  the  price  of 
nickel  as  compared  with  cobalt.  Why,  therefore,  should  it  vary  this  rule 
onlv  in  the  case  of  gold  and  silver. 

'^Mthough  the  great  American  government  in  good  old  times  took  it 
upon  itself  to  say  that  gold  was  worth  by  weight  sixteen  times  as  much  as 


THE   ALPHA   OF   MONEY  25 

silver,  it  did  not  follow  out  the  idea  logically  or  it  would  have  coined  a 
gold  piece  equal  in  weight  to  the  silver  dollar  piece  and  would  have  called  it 
a  sixteen  dollar  piece  or  "Eagle."  But  the  gentlemen  having  the  matter  in 
hand  did  not  do  so.  The  Government  as  they  thought  was  dealing  in 
values  and  prices  which  they  themselves  controlled  by  virtue  of  the 
power  conferred  upon  them  and  vested  in  them  by  the  state,  and  they 
therefore  say  in  judgment  to  fix  prices  for  all  time,  considering  weight 
as  quite  a  secondary  matter. 

It  is  no  doubt  the  correct  and  sensible  thing  to  use  the  same  weight 
in  dealing  with  gold  and  silver,  or  any  other  valuable  metal  which  any  of 
our  citizens  might  be  pleased  to  ask  our  mints  to  coin.  Among  these 
metals  are  platinum,  osmium,  iridium,  palladium,  rhodium,  (which  are 
"noble"  metals)  besides  others. 

There  is  no  good  reason  why  our  just  Government  of  the  people,  for 
the  people,  and  by  the  people,  should  not  treat  the  gentlemen  who  might 
ask  tliese  favors, for  their  valuable  commodity  with  exactly  the  same 
courtesy  and  upon  exactly  the  same  "basis"  that  it  treats  the  holders  of 
those  valuable  commodities  gold  and  silver;  for  this  is,  or  ought  to 
be,  a  government  of  justice  and  equal  rights  to  all  and  arbitrary  govern- 
mental privileges  to  none. 

We  would  coin  them  all  by  the  system  indicated,  but  would  give  the 
coins  different,  explicit,  and  appropriate  names  which  was  not  done  under 
the  old  dollar  system.  There  would  be  no  need  for  using  the  same  name 
for  two  altogether  diiferent  things  as  has  been  done  under  the  old  dollar 
arrangement. 

AVe  as  a  just  Government,  ought  of  course  to  do  the  fair  thing  in 
this  coinage  matter,  but  some  substances  would  not  do  to  to  coin  on  ac- 
count of  their  physical  properties.  Osmium  fuses  with  exceeding  difll- 
culty  and  probably  could  not  be  coined;  however,  we  wull  not  remove 
any  metals  or  substances  from  our  coinage  list  except  "for  cause,"  and 
those  that  are  well  fitted  and  can  pass  the  proper  examination  as  to  coin- 
ability,  price,  etc.,  would  be  allowed  upon  the  list  of  our  "four  hundred." 

We  believe  in  "metal  service  reform,"  and  there  is  no  "offensive  par- 
tisanary"  about  us.  Our  scheme  might  help  some  "infant  industries"  in 
raining^  metallurgy,  etc.,  by  simply  not  excluding  any  metal  from  a  fair 
field  and  no  favor.  It  is  not  just  that  gold  alone,  or  even  gold  and  silver 
should  have  the  money  monopoly,  on  the  simple  claim  that  itisthe  grace 
of  (iod  something  that  governijients  are  bound  to  sustain  by  arbitrary 
legislation  and  power. 

If  the  sign  for  an  Orent  were  an  O,  then  01.50  would  be  l}4  Orents 
and  so  on.  0.25  would  mean  34  of  an  Orent  or  25  Orats.  The  old  twen- 
ty dollar  piece  contains  464.4  grains  pure  gold;  divide  this  by  four,  the 
number  of  grains  of  pure  gold  in  an  Orat,  and  we  get  116.1,  that  is  the 
equivalent  in  Orats  ot  the  twenty  dollar  piece.  If  we  move  the  decimal 
prrpevly  we  get  01.161,  that  is  one  Orent  and  16  1-10  Orats.  The  gold 
dollar  contains  23.22  grains  troy  pure  gold;  divide  by  four  and  you  get 
5.805  its  equWalent  in  Orats.  If  we  called  in  common  use  5.8  Orats  one 
dollar,  then  it  would  make  a  diiference  of  just  one  dollar  in  1161  gold 
dollars,  they  would  be  just  $1  more  than  if  we  called  it  equal  to  5.805 
Orats. 

The  gold  men  surely  ought  to  be  pleased  with  our  sign  for  an  Orent 
—it  is  the  old  alchemical  one  for  gold,  the  same  as  the  astrological  sign 
for  the  sun,  that  great  source  of  heat,  power  and  light.  AVe  have  used 
the  two  denominations  of  units  and  hundredths  as  we  do  in  the  dollar 
system  of  computation  and  in  that  respect  they  are  alike  and  our  peo- 
ple have  nothing  to  learn. 'frhe  ease  with  which  any  piece  of  silver  could 
be  transferred  into  terms  of  our  coins  is  remarkable. 

If  we  divide  871.25  the  number  of  grains  of  pure  silver  in  "the  dol- 
ar  of  our  dads,"  by  four  we  will  have  the  result  of  92.8125  the  value  of 
the  old  dollar  in  the  the  terms  of  the  Argat,  on  the  supposition  that  it 
it  should  be  taken  on  its  merits  for  the  silver  in  it  and  not  as  a  repre- 
sentative coin.  If  we  move  the  decimal  we  convert  it  into  Argents,  and 
it  becomes  A.928125,  rather  an  unwieldly  number,  but  then  the  old  dol- 
lar of  our  dads  is  an  ugly  and  impossible  coin  under  any  point  of  view 
But  as  we  do  not  as  a  Government  have  to  take  them  as  bullion,  but  to 
redeem  them  in  gold  at  their  nominal  value,  we  are  not  troubled  with 
the  question.  If  taken  as  buHion  they  would  simply  be  weighed  and  9-10 
of  the  result  would  be  pure  silver  and  this  weight  in  grains  divided  by 
400  gives  the  number  of  Argents  or  new  silver  coins  to  which  they 


26  THE   ALPHA   OF   MONEY 

would  be  equivalent.  Or  balanced  with  Argents  in  any  way  the  bullion 
would  be  equivalent,  as  it  is  9-10  fine.  This  latter  would  be  the  easy  way 
and  no  doubt  the  way  that  would  be  pursued  by  the  Government  in 
dealing  with  such  bullion. 

If  we  take  the  trade  dollar,  which  consists  of  420  grains  of  silver 
9-10  fine,  or  378  grains  of  pure  silver,  and  divide  by  four  we  have  94.5 
Argats  or  A.945,  which  is  not  so  bad,  being  quite  a  convertable  number, 
it  means  that  one  trade  doller  is  worth  94,5  Argats. 

1  have  read  in  a  pamphlet  by  Senator  Stewart,  the  tall  pine  of 
Nevada,  may  his  shadow  as  well  as  that  of  that  twin  giant  Senator  Jones, 
never  grow  less,  that  the  Mexican  dollar  weighs  41(14  grains  .903  fine. 
Therefore,  proper  multiplication  shows  that  the  Mexican  dollar  contains. 
376.0092  grains  of  pure  silver,  which  practically  is  376  grains  of  pure 
silver.  Divide  by  four  and  you  have  94,  the  number  of  Argats  in  a 
Mexican  dollar.  Certainly  it  is  a  very  smooth  number  for  international 
trade.  Therefore  it  is  seen  that  the  Trade  dollar  had  about  two  grains 
more  of  silver  in  it  than  the  Mexican  dollar,  which  was  what  was  in- 
tended, it  having  been  made  ostensibly  to  compete  with  the  Mexican 
in  the  China  trade,  but  it  was  made  much  more  particularly  for  the  pur- 
pose of  paying  Chinese  workmen  on  the  C.  P.  R.  R .  and  this  slight 
quantity  more  of  silver  was  pat  in  to  induce  John  to  take  it  instead  of 
the  Mexican  to  which  he  was  accustomed. 

These  Trade  dollars  were  given  out  by  banking  firms  in  California 
on  a  par  with  the  gold  dollar,  and  when  the  country  was  flooded  with 
them  and  they  were  merrily  circulating  at  this  rate,  suddenly,  as  all  Cal- 
if ornians  will  remember  and  even  men  in  other  states,  for  the  swindle 
was  not  confined  to  California,  they  were  shut  down  upon  for  they  were 
not  "bankable,"  as  it  was  said,  and  they  were  eventually  bought  in  in  vast 
quantities,  often  bv  these  same  firms  or  men,  and  often  at  a  price  much 
lower  than  their  bullion  value— another  and  one  of  the  very  minor 
swindles  that  have  been  practiced  under  this  accursed  protected  gold 
standard  and  this  illogical  dollar  system,  I  remember,  1  was  a  boy  then, 
and  wondered  why  the  big  silver  dollar  was  worth  less  than  the  little  one. 
I  know  now.  but,  "  'Tis  little  joy  to  know  1  am  farther  oft'  from  Heaven 
than  when  1  was  a  boy." 

The  "Stamp  of  the" Covernment"  killed  the  Trade  dollar — has  been 
slaughtering  silver  the  world  over  and  has  made  gold  to  be  the  money 
monarch  and  trade  despot  of  the  world.  Let  us  take  the  divine  right 
from  this  pampered  yellow  child  of  favoritism  and  strip  him  of  his  false 
honors  by  giving  the  right  of  monetization  to  all  metals  and  substances. 
We  will  not  take  anything  from  gold  that  justly  belongs  to  him,  but  he 
must  come  down  and  fight  on  level  ground  according  to  fair  rules.  If  he 
is  so  good  he  will  not  fear  a  "fair  field."  If  silver  is  so  good  he  will  court 
"no  favor."  So  let  these  burly  giants  fight  it  out  while  we  hold  the  bot- 
tle and  see  to  fair  play.  The  victor  shall  have  the  belt,  but  he  shall  de- 
fend it  against  all  comers. 

That's  the  kind  of  a  Free  Trader  w^e  are.  Why  should  not  England 
agree  to  the  same.  Of  course  she  will  when  it  is  put  to  her  in  the  right 
light  and  she  sees  the  justice  of  it.  For  the  Briton  is  honest  and  this 
plar/  is  an  honest  one.  We  believe  in  Free  men  and  Free  trade  and  con- 
sequently in  a  Free  monetary  system.  Also,  owing  no  doubt  to  the 
obliquity  of  our  early  moral  training  we  have  a  sneaking  liking  for  a 
free  fight— when  it  is  a  fair  one. 

If  the  trade  dollar  had  been  made  also  into  true  halves,  quarters 
and  tenths  and  the  "subsidiary"  coins  representing  the  gold  dollar  re- 
deemed in  gold  and  taken  out  of  the  "currency"  at  that  time,  we  would 
then  have  settled  the  silver  question,  but  with  a  monetary  or  coinage 
system  of  very  false  nomenclature  and  faulty  weights  for  then  and  there 
practically  none  of  the  "dollars  of  our  dads"  in  existence. 

We  should  cultivate  the  most  pleasant  relationship  with  our 
neighbors  across  the  Rio  Grande  who  have,  from  Sonora  to  Yucatan, 
from  Tamaulipas  to  Soconusco,  so  often  and  generously  shed  their  blood 
and  given  up  their  lives  in  the  cause  of  struggling  liberty.  The  same 
may  be  said  for  the  rest  of  our  American  sisters  as  the  rest  of  mankind. 

The  French  five  franc  piece  weighs  twenty-five  grammes  9  10  fine  or 
385.8  grains  and  contains,  therefore,  347.22  grains  of  pure  silver,  divide  by 
four  and  you  have  86.805  Argats  or  A.  .86805  Argents  a  number  not  the 
smoothest  in  the  world  but  still  quite  manageable.  It  is  the  same  as 
our  subsidary  dollar.  The  "subsids"  that  we  propose  to  make  to  subside. 
This  system,  therefore,  is  eminently  practical  and  practicable  and  this  is 
what  it  was  intended  to  be. 


THE  ALPHA  OF  MONEY  27 

If  you  should  say  that  one  Orent  was  worth  eighteen  Argents,  or 
1934  Argents,  or  fifteen  Argents,  these  numbers  would  show  the  actual 
price  relationship  or  exchange  ratio  subsisting  by  weight  between  these 
two  metals  in  tlie  markets  of  the  world.     This  system  in  every   way  is 
just,  practical  and  simple.     -By  adopting  this  system  the  money  of  any 
place  or  busmess  would  be  its  money  of  account.     That  is,  the  "poor 
man's  money"  like  the  "rich  man's  money"  would  be  in  fact  and  in  deed 
money.    It  is  no  Sanscrit  tor  labor  and  enterprising  industry  to  be  only 
understood  by  a  rich  aud  protected  gold  priesthood  and  nobility  as  is  our 
present  dollar  system.      It  was  made  for  common  every  day  life  as  well 
as  for  the  largest  transactions.      Gold  is  not  by  it  prevented  from  being 
used  as  money  and  will  continue  to  be  so  used,  but  will  not  be  the  money 
autocrat  as  tliat  office  will  be  abolished,  and  all  moneys  will  have  to 
••shoot  Luke  or  give  up  the  gun,"  and  silver  will  have  a  chance  as  well  as 
the  other  apostles  to  "take  up  the  Acts  and  cut  on."      It  takes  nothing 
from  gold  that  actually  belongs  to  it  and  does  all  the  metals  simple  and 
exact  justice.    Gold  will  undoubtedly  be  ever  by  far  the  more  valua  ble 
metal  on  account  of  its  peculiar  chemical  and  physical  properties.  Its  in- 
destructibility, scarcity  and  beauty. 

.As  to  token  coins  they  should  be  considered  only  as  the  tradesman's 
tokens  of  that  great  anonymous  business  association,  or  agency,  the 
Government,  made  for  the  convenience  of  its  own  trade  at  the  postoffice 
and  elsewhere  and  not  to  be  forced  upon  anybody  except  the  Govern- 
ment itself.  People  could  take  them  or  not  as  they  liked,  there  would 
be  no  legal  tender  tyranny  back  of  them.  They  would  naturally  take 
them  without  dissent  as  they  would  no  doubt  be  good. 

TOKEN  COINAGE,  ETC. 

Now  by  that  same  token  business  firms  would  all  have  the  right  to 
issue  tokens  but  not  the  same  as  those  of  tlie  United  fetates  as  that 
would  be  forgery,  nor  should  they  be  allowed  to  make  them  to  decep- 
tively resemble  those  of  the  United  States,  for  that  would  be  constructive- 
ly furgery  and  in  intent  and  reality  the  same  thing.  But  they  have  the 
riglit  to  issue  each  one  his  particular  token  for  Orents,  Argents,  Orats, 
Argais  or  anything  else  to  be  redeemable  on  demand  and  to  be  forced  on 
nobody  but  the  hrm  or  man  who  issues  them  and  thereby  stands  respon- 
sible for  them. 

But  now  here  comes  in  a  consideration.  Suppose  these  business 
firms  and  individuals  should  take  it  upon  themselves  to  use  the  token 
coins  of  the  United  States  Government  in  their  own  business.  Which 
no  doubt  they  would  prefer  to  do,  at  least  in  practically  every  instance 
on  account  of  convenience,  which  would  be  founded  on  their  far  wider 
acceptability,  as  they  would  be  issued  by  an  association  or  agency,  the 
United  States,  universally  known  and  which  virtually  cannot  "bust," 
and  which  possesses  immense  and  perennial  resources,  and  besides  in 
this  case  promises  on  issuing  them  to  neither  act  the  knave  nor  the  fool. 
What  should  be  done  unaer  the  above  mentioned  circumstance,  for  in 
this  token  or  representative  coin  business  lies  the  great  pitfall  that  be- 
sets the  pathway  of  true  commerce  and  finance,  which  in  the  system 
propsed  in  this  article  has  been  made  as  small  as  possible  by  taking 
away  the  legal  tender  tyranny  and  making  token  coins  repr*^sentative  of 
smaller  quantities  than  any  standard  coin  of  the  metal  represented.  The 
Government  can  liardly  refuse,  however,  to  furnish  token  coins  of  such 
smaller  sort  for  the  nation.  A  great  pressure  would  be  brought  to  bear 
as  it  would  be  so  great  a  public  want  as  to  amount  almost  to  a  public 
necessity,  or  at  least  great  convenience. 

As  it  is  probably  a  thing  that  can  be  done  by  the  Government  better 
than  by  any  possible  private  enterprise,  it  is  undoubtedly  a  very  proper 
thing  for  Government  to  do;  if  so,  it  should  go  at  it  sensibly,  it  should 
in  no  way  strain  its  "credit"  by  issuing  these  token  coins  against  nothing 
or  against  a  small  proportionate  reserve.  Leave  such  things  to  private 
business  that  may  be  willing  to  take  such  risks  or  to  the  men  that  deal 
with  or  in  them.  Let  them  all  take  their  own  risks.  Such  "banking"  is 
no  part  of  the  true  business  of  the  United  States  Government. 

Our  agent  for  the  payment  of  our  debts,  the  warehousing  of  our 
money,  and  the  collection  of  our  debts  and  revenues  is  not  asked  to  "fly 
Xites"  nor  balloon  systems  of  "credit  money."  nor  go  into  the  accordeon 
business  of  "contraction,"  "expansion"  nor  "inflation"  which  is  music 
for  the  solid  financial  speculator  but  which  squeezes  labor  and  enter- 
prise most  unmercifully.    Nor  the  bellows  business  which  first  sucks  the 


28  THE   ALPHA   OF   MONEY 

people  in  and  then  blows  them  into  the  fire  to  heat  the  irons  of  money 
monopoly. 

Therefore  if  the  Government  issue  token  coins  to  private  citizens  or 
business  firms,  it  should  go  at  it  honestly,  safely  and  sensibly,  giving  out 
its  tokens  in  exchange  for  the  coins  of  the  metal  represented  thereby, 
and  depositing  the  full  amount  of  coin  represented  by  these  tokens  to  be 
held  in  reserve  absolutely  sacred  for  the  payment  of  these  tokens  and 
for  no  other  purpose.  Such  funds  should  be  looked  upon  the  same  as 
those  deposited  for  the  proposed  "Orent"  and  -'Argent"  bills,  that  is  not 
to  be  considered  in  any  wa>  as  the  property  of  the  Government  of  the 
United  States,  but  as  sacred  reserve  by  it  held  in  trust  for  specific  pur- 
pose and  not  to  be  applied  to  any  other." 

The  United  States  Government  does  not  need  to  do  anything  to  di- 
lute or  "expand"  the  money  of  the  country  nor  to  'contract"  nor  sur- 
charge nor  magnifv  its  power.  There  should  be  cloth  for  every  coat, 
and  the  Government  does  not  need  to  make  the  coins  or  currency  of  the 
c:)untry  to  be  in  any  way  different  from  what  they  seem  to  be,  for  this 
will  always  tend  to  the  unfair  advantage  of  the  favored  few  and  to  the 
injury  of  the  many.  The  government  should  watch  its  token  coinage 
very  closely  and  should  call  it  in  at  times,  for  new  of  different  design, 
in  order  to  investigate  or  put  a  check  upon  any  nefarious  practice. 

The  issuance  of  token  coins  is  always  surrounded  by  dangers,  but 
under  the  system  here  proposed,  they  are  reduced  to  almost  nothing  for 
the  people  have  the  opportunity  to  protect  themselves  by  presenting  the 
tokens  for  redemption,  in  which,  if  the  Government  should  fail,  there 
would  be  no  legal  tender  tyranny  to  step  in  and  make  a  man  take  worth- 
less bits  of  metal  for  coins  of  real  trade  value.  Under  this  idea  any 
bank,  association  or  individual  could  issue  bills,  notes  or  promises  to 
pay,  but  no  man  would  be  forced  to  take  them;  this  would  not,  however, 
in  any  way  diminish  the  liability  of  the  concern  issuing  them,  and  if 
payment  were  denied  upon  presentation,  in  accordance  with  the  terms 
thereof,  the  holder  would  have  an  action  and  a  right  to  a  summary  suit 
against  the  concern  for  the  value  thereof,  as  well  as  a  criminal  action 
together  with  the  state  for  falsifying  valuable  paper,  for  getting  money 
under  false  pretences  and  robbing  the  public,  common  thievery  of  large 
amounts.  Thereforefore  some  live  person  or  persons  would  have  to  be 
or  ought  to  be  held  criminally  and  summarily  responsible. 

Therefore  a  corporation  would  not  count  high,  if  there  were  nobody 
there,  to  be  criminally  and  personally  held  liable  for  this  crime  against 
the  people,  this  at  least  appears  to  me  to  be  a  way  of  partially  protecting 
the  dear  public.  Any  rigid  banking  law  or  rule'  would  probably  insist 
also  that  no  such  bills  should  be  emitted  except  agains  the  corresponding 
reserve,  and  would  provide  methods  of  inspection  to  insure  such  being 
the  case,  or  at  least  would  report  if  such  were  not  the  case.  Another 
rule  that  would  hold  good  is  that  no  private  concern  should  be  allowed 
to  issue  bills  or  notes  of  any  kind  deceptively  resembling  the  gold  and 
silver  notes  of  the  government,  as  that  would  be  another  method  of 
fraud. 

The  United  States,  therefore,  should  adopt  some  specific  size,  shape 
and  color  for  its  gold  notes,  another  for  its  silver  notes,  which  should 
not  even  be  approximately  imitated  by  any  private  firm,  as  has  been 
done  in  the  case  of  some  national  bank  notes,  some  of  which  closely  re- 
semble the  greenback,  and  others  the  gold  note  of  the  United  States, 
and  no  doubt  such  design  was  adopted  because  of  the  wider  acceptabil- 
ity of  the  gold  note  and  greenback  as  now  issued. 

Xo  doubt  some  puns  and  no  little  fun  can  and  will  be  made  over  the 
words,  "Orats,"  "Orents,"  "Argats,"  "Argents,"  etc.,  but  these  names  had 
to  be  invented  by  the  author  to  properly  explain  the  theory  and  system. 
If  you  think  you  can  do  better,  try  it,  and  if  you  or  the  government 
succeed,  why  let  such  names  be  accepted  and  adopted. 

What's  in  a  name?  We  do  not  claim  anything  on  these  names,  but 
we  do  on  the  system  which  puts  everything  on  an  even  keel  where  every 
man  who  has  anything  to  do  with  money  or  its  representatives  can  un- 
derstand it  and  that  is  just  what  out  to  done.  It  takes  the  science  of 
money  out  of  the  realms  of  magic  and  the  black  art,  and  puts  it  on  a 
sensible  and  universally  comprehensible  basis.  Under  this  system  every 
man  would  become,  to  this  extent  at  least,  a  "financier"  which  would  be 
as  it  shoula  be.  This  system  would  settle  the  monetary  and  silver  ques- 
tion forever,  and  would  settle  it  right.     All  other  remedies  which  have 


THE  ALPHA  OF  MONEY  29 

been  proposed  are  either  empirical  or  illusory.  This  removes  the  soul 
of  the  evil  and  removes  it  forever.  It  would  be  thrown  out  of  legisla- 
tive halls  and  would  no  longer  be  a  subject  for  Government  intervention. 

BRUSSELS   CONFERENCE,   ETC. 

The  proposition  of  Mr.  Rothschilds  to  the  Brussels  monetary  confer- 
ence for  the  Governments  of  the  world  to  buy  up  the  silver  of  the  world 
with  gold  is  but  putting  the  matter  off.  It  is  but  a  short  lived  expedi- 
ent, the  temporary  daming  of  a  resistless  tide,  a  sort  of  universal  silver 
bill.  The  Brussels  conference  will  no  doubt  do  a  great  deal  of  good  in 
that  it  will  stir  the  subject  of  finance  and  money  to  its  foundation  and 
set  the  w^orld  to  studying  on  the  merits  of  the  monetary  question.  But 
in  its  immediate  object  it  is  certainly  a  colossal  farce. 

That  object  as  1  understand  it  is  to  fix  the  ratio  at  which  gold  and 
silver  shall  be  exchanged,  or  perhaps  more  accurately  to  fix  the  price  of 
silver  in  terms  of  gold  of  which  the  money  units  are  presumed  to  be 
always  made,  that  is,  it  w^ouid  if  it  could,  arbitrarily  insure  the  universal 
demonetization  of  silver  and  absolute  monetization  of  gold  only. 

8ome  people  want  it  to  put  a  "dollars  worth"  of  silver  in  a  silver 
dollar,  or  fix  a  new  coinage  ratio  for  silver.  Others  want  it  to  stick  to 
the  old  ratio  of  16  to  1.  Others  proposed  15^^  etc.,  and  still  others  scout 
the  idea  that  silver  should  ever  be  used  at  all.  It  is  expected  to  be  a 
terrenal  appraisement  board,  a  universal  price  setter.  In  order  to  suc- 
ceed, it  should  have  the  power  to  nullify  every  contract  however  solemn 
that  run  contrary  to  its  dictum,  and  by  this  means  establish  a  universal 
"alternative  standard"  which  would  be  manifestly  arbitrary  not  to  say 
impossible,  and  by  which  silver  would  be  tied  down  by  its  yellow  rival. 
Why  is  not  the  scope  of  its  powers  extended?  \\  hy  should  it  not  fix  the 
price  that  shall  ever  obtain  between  wheat  and  barley,  for  instance,  or 
between  copper  and  iron?  Why  should  it  not  be  empowered  to  forever 
fix  all  prices  and  give  us  a  terrestial  price  equivalent  list?  fSo  that 
when  we  contract  a  debt  in  gold,  for  example,  we  may  know  just  how 
much  copper,  iron  or  silver,  or  wheat,  potatoes  or  hay  we  may  give  in- 
stead, as  legal  tender,  in  case  we  do  not  happen  to  have  the  gold  or  do 
not  wish  to  pay  in  gold. 

The  old  rule  or  idea  pursued  by  Government  as  to  coinage,  and  fol- 
lowed probably  by  Jelferson,  Hamilton,  etc.,  was  perhaps  this:  They 
supposed  that  there  was  sixteen  times  as  much  silver  in  the  world  by 
weight  as  there  was  gold,  and  that  all  the  silver  in  the  w^orld  should  be 
exchanged  evenly  for  all  the  gold,  and  gold  should  therefore  be  made 
sixteen  times  as  valuable  as  silver,  and  such  is  the  price  they  had  placed 
between  them.  As  if  in  case  for  instance,  there  were  sixteen  times  as 
much  wheat  in  the  world  as  there  is  barley,  therfore  its  price  should  be 
sixteen  times  as  high ;  or  because  there  were  sixteen  times  as  much  nickel 
in  the  world  as  cobalt,  therefore  such  should  be  the  price  or  exchange 
ratio  subsisting  between  them  by  weight.  They  did  not  understand  that 
it  would  be  possible  to  haye  say  thirty  times  as  much  silver  in  the  world 
as  gold,  and  still  have  their  exchange  ratio  at  fifteen  to  one  for  instance. 

It  is  demand  that  always  pays  a  price.  It  is  always  the  user,  and 
herein  originates  the  trade  value.  If  nobody  uses  or  wants  a  thing  it 
will  never  have  a  price.  There  is  now^  a  tremendous  demand  for  gold  to 
pay  debts  with,  which  demand  is  fearfully  increasing,  for  the  interest  on 
these  debts  is  far  greater  than  the  world's  supply  of  gold  and  is  con- 
stantly increasing  in  such  a  manner  that  the  gold  owners,  under  a  single 
gold  standard,  the  gold  contracts  and  the  collection  laws  that  now  exist 
are  bound  in  a  short  time  to  own  not  only  the  gold  of  the  world  but  all 
other  property  as  well. 

Enterprise  and  industry  are  either  becoming  enslaved  or  squeeezed 
out  and  thrown  as  vagabonds  and  wanderers  out  on  the  face  of  the 
earth.  They  must  either  take  on  the  yoke  and  become  slaves  and  servile 
task  masters  or  they  must  die.  The  result  is  the  same  and  inevitable 
although  some  of  them  may  struggle  far  longer  than  others.  And  what 
real  good  does  this  do  to  the  owners  of  gold  who  also  have  enterprise 
and  are  valuable  to  the  country?  None.  Still  there  is  no  respite,  and 
still  nations  by  infernal  legal  tender  laws  and  protected  units  of  value 
will  persist  in  this  enslavement  or  mankind. 

Our  system  relieves  Government  of  the  sacred  duty  and  proud  prerog- 
ative of  appraising  other  people's  property  and  allows  people  to  buy  and 
trade  in  what  they  will.  Though  our  statesmen  fixed  the  price  or  ratio  at 


30  TUK   ALPHA   OF   MONEY 

one  to  sixteen,  our  French  friends  placed  it  at  one  to  fifteen  and  one  half. 
There  is  not  much  trouble  in  keeping  up  these  ratios  if  Government  or 
the  people  will  always  put  up  the  difference  which  is  in  fact  what  they 
must  always  do  under  such  a  system.  Our  object  is  to  relieve  Govern- 
ment from  being  a  price  ^settler,  and  thereby  relieve  this  lamb  from  the 
necessity  of  being  so  frequently  bled  by  the  vampires  of  trade  or  shorn 
by  the  shears  of  great  tinancial  conspiracies.  We  propose  to  protect  it 
from  exposure  to  wolves  of  the  money  trade  which  could  never  happen 
if  it  did  not  continually  stray  oft'  under  the  moonstruck  hallucination 
that  it  can  bleat  values. 

If  the  plan  here  outlined  were  adopted  by  the  United  States  it  would 
at  once  become  the  tinancial  safe-harbor  of  the  world.  Confidence  would 
be  completely  and  forever  restored,  when  it  was  known  that  the  Govern- 
ment was  out  of  the  business  of  tinkering  with  money  and  conducted  its 
own  affairs  upon  a  safe,  solid  and  sensible  basis  with  no  legal  tender 
tyranny,  no  Jiitesse,  no  chicanery,  no  jugglery  and  no  indecision,  but  ac- 
cording to  a  well  known,  just,  honest,  and  equitable  plan 

We  would,  under  this  system,  have  silver  as  well  as  gold  clearing 
houses  in  this  country  and  as  we  said  before  the  round  of  commerce 
could  be  made  complete  in  either  money^  We  would  become  the  Mecca 
of  the  trading  nations  of  the  earth  both  of  gold  and  silver  units  of 
money,  Commerce  would  roll  in  unknown  tloods  to  our  shores  and  the 
tide  of  prosperity  for  our  people  would  be  such  as  our  world  had  never 
known  in  ail  its  history.  The  toilers  both  wliite  and  dark  round  about 
the  earth  would  pour  such  treasures  of  wealth  into  our  lap  as  no  nation 
on  earth  has  ever  before  been  blessed  with  and  it  would  be  to  their  own 
immense  advantage  as  well.  No  international  conference  wuuld  be 
needed  except  perhaps  to  consider  the  subject  of  weight. 

As  long  as  mints  are  run  as  tliey  are,  there  is  no  necessity  that  different 
nations  should  use  the  same  standard  coins,  or  coins  of  the  same  weight, 
to  pass  current  in  all,  and  there  is  one  very  great  objection,  that  is,  if 
our  government  mjikes  up  the  loss  from  abrasion.  Let  the  nation  that 
handles  the  money  and  thereby  causes  the  abrasion  pay  for  it. 

We  would  trade  our  metals  with  the  people  that  would  take  them. 
Imagine  free  trade  of  this  nature  with  Mexico,  South  America,  India, 
China,  etc.  We  would  soon  disgorge  if  there  should  by  any  plethora  of 
silver,  and  rapidly  get  into  commercial  fighting  trim  and  our  fat  would 
become  strength.  Certain  nations  will  not  allow  the  use  of  silver  as 
money  by  their  people  at  all.  We  cannot  help  it.  Wa  cannot  force  any 
thing  upon  anybody  nor  do  we  need  to  try.  liut  with  free  trade  we  can 
trade  with  those  who  will  trade  with  us. 

We  can  sell  wheat  and  cotton  in  a  gold  market  and  pay  our  debts  of 
gold  in  gold,  and  we  can,  if  we  wish,  buy  manufactures  in  the  silver 
market.  But  as  a  matter  of  fact  we  would  manufacture  the  raw  ma- 
terial of  a  silver  world.  Our  factories  would  be  thrown  wide  open  and 
all  but  the  robber  sort  could  run  if  they  pleased  day  and  night  and  there 
would  be  employment  for  every  man,  w^oman  and  child  throughout  these 
United  States.  Every  driving  wheel  would  strain  at  full  duty,  eVery  belt 
would  course  at  full  speed. 

Our  foreign  yellow  friends  who  are  so  good  in  their  own  country 
would  stay  there  and  send  their  wares  instead  of  bringing  themselves  to 
gorge  an  over  glutted  labor  market.  We  could  'swap"  jack  knives  for  silk 
handkerchiefs  or  raw  silks  witiiout  having  to  rub  noses  with  them  as  we 
do  now.  The  commerce  that  would  spring  up  would  be  such  as  the 
world  cannot  now  even  imagine.  It  would  give  a  tremendous  incentive 
to  production  to  them  and  to  us.  Our  miners  and  farmers  would  have 
active  markets  for  all  their  products.  It  would  incre^^i^e  our  manufac- 
ture of  those  things  we  are  best  fitted  to  manufacture  to  a  point  never 
before  believed  possible,  aiid  open  up  the  age  of  electricity  with  a  bril- 
liancy of  reality  brigliter  than  has  ever  been  the  wildest  dream  of  the 
most  enthusiastic  visionary.  It  would  make  a  bound  in  the  progress  of 
mankind  only  comparable  to  the  American  Declaration  of  Independence 
or  the  Magna  Charta  of  England. 

"The  taste  of  hot  Arahia's  sjjice  we'd  know 

Free  from  tlie  scorcliing  sun  that  nlakes  it  grow. 

Without  the  worm  in  Peisia's  silk  we'd  sliine, 

And  witiiout  plautinK  drink  of  every  vine ; 

Ours  would  be  the  harvest  where  the  Indians  mow, 

We  would  i)low  the  deep  and  reap  what  others  sow. ' ' 


THE   ALPHA   OF   MONEY  31 

And  they  would  reap  as  well— such  benefits  are  mutual.  We  would 
do  business  on  the  square,  any  man  could  use  the  money  that  he  pleased, 
and  we  would  deceive,  coerce  or  swindle  nobody.  We  would  hear  no 
more  of  '•silver  liCgislation"  or  "Gold  Legislation"  than  we  do  now  of 
wheat,  wool  or  copper  legislation,  that  is,  at  least  as  far  as  concerns  trade 
within  the  Unitea  states. 

xVs  to  the  metal  trade  between  countries,  any  money  or  standard 
colli  has  always  been  handled  and  priced  as  well  known  certitied  bullion 
and  ever  will  be,  because  in  that  case  they  are  actually  exchanged.  Why 
should  not  a  similar  rule  obtain  within  a  country,  of  course  modihed  by 
a.  replacement  within  a  slight  hinit  of  the  loss  due  to  abrasion  as  a 
charge  on  the  whole  people  who  by  their  handhng  brought  it  about,  and 
tueretore  pay  for  it  to  keep  the  com  up  to  its  price  standard  or  real  value 
so  that  rapid  computation  would  be  ever  practicable  and  constant  weigh- 
ing never  required. 

Uf  course  sweaters  should  be  hunted  and  punished  severely,  and 
there  are  good  reasons  why  counterfeiters  should  be  punished  by  death 
which  1  have  not  the  space  to  give.  'Jliey  should  never  on  any  account 
be  let  oft"  with  less  than  life  imprisonment 

'rii9  Government  should  treat  foreign  coins  with  exact  justice  and 
give  the  right  price  tor  them  at  the  mint,  which  should  be  guaged  hon- 
estly by  the  weight  of  pure  metal  they  contain;  they  are  not  be  discrim- 
inated against,  nor  should  this  rule  vary  because  of  the  state  of  our 
feelings  tor  that  country.  The  world's  markets  do  not  mix  hatred,  tear 
or  jealousy  with  the  quality  or  price  of  goods.  Why  should  a  sensible 
government  act  differently  V  It  should  look  at  the  coin  and  what  it  is 
without  any  reference  to  the  nation  that  minted  it,  except  so  far  as  to 
ascertain  whether  Its  mint  practices  are  alwas  scrupulously  exact.  We 
have  nothing  to  do  in  such  case  with  the  state  of  diplomacy  or  the  amity 
or  the  lack  of  it  subsisting  between  ourselves  and  the  maker  of  the  for- 
eign coin.  This  would  be  nothing  but  common  honesty  and  would  pre- 
vent a  good  deal  of  loss  to  industry  through  the  the  exactions  of  unjust 
money  changing. 

The  argument  that  money  should  be  made  of  gjold  alone  and  should 
be  specially  protected  by  Government  because  it  is  more  valuable  by 
weight  than  silver,  or  some  other  substance,  and  will  always  undoubtedly 
be  so,  is  an  argument  to  which  Government  need  pay  no  attention.  It 
IS  no  affair  of  the  (iovernment  whether  Mr.  Jones  of  ^ew  York,  who 
owes  Mr.  8mith  of  London,  or  vice  versa  can  square  his  account  with 
a  keg  of  gold,  a  dray  load  of  silver,  a  ship  load  of  wheat,  or  a  very  val- 
uable diamond  which  a  man  may  wear  on  his  Ihiger.  These,,  however, 
may  be  reasons  sometimes,  why  Mr.  Jones  and  Smith  prefer  to  use  gold 
as  the  metal  of  account  in  their  transactions.  If  so  let  them  be  free  to 
do  so,  and  Mr.  Jones  and  (Smith  in  some  other  place  may  prefer  to  use 
silver,  if  so,  let  them  be  free  to  do  so. 

The  settlement  of  the  money  question  would  be  a  great  step  in 
the  progress  of  mankind,  and  would  put  us  where  we  could  make  new 
departures  of  still  greater  interest,  perhaps,  and  beneiit  to  humanity.  If 
the  abolition  of  slavery  is  so  good,  why  shouldn't  we  have  some  more? 

Under  the  abolition  of  the  "'legal  tender"  and  protected  '"standard  of 
value"  or  protected  money  tyranny  and  the  recognition  of  the  tact  that 
debts  are  payable  in  what  they  may  be  contracted  in,  and  that  congress 
ought  not  be  a  value  lixer  or  price  setter,  none  of  our  money  or  coins 
could  be  called  "debased,"  nor  could  any  of  them  be  called  "inllated." 
(iold  and  silver  coins  could  be  money  in  the  true  sense.  They  would  all  be 
"irredeemable"  or  ot  "ultimate  redemption,"  and  they  would  all  be  honest 
as  they  would  go  in  trade  for  what  they  were  worth.  The  "volume"  of 
money  would  be  justly  and  enormously  increased  and  the  production  of 
minesalso  vastly  stimulated.  We  would  thus  have  all  the  gold  in  the  world 
that  we  had  before  and  in  addition  thereto  all  the  immense  "money  pow- 
er" there  might  be  in  the  silver  of  the  world.  This  would  no  doubt 
afford  great  relief  to  the  overburdened  laboring  humanity  of  the  world, 
at  least  for  considerable  time,  but  it  would  not  prevent,  as  some  perhaps 
may  imagine,  the  inequitable  distribution  and  extraordinary  concen- 
tration of  wealth  which  at  present  obtains. 

The  subject  comes  more  particularly  under  the  consideration,  of 
wills,  debts,  public  and  private,  collection  security,  bonds,  interest,  taxes, 
transportation,  mortgages  •  and  other  "evidences  of  prosperity,"  corpora- 
tions, estatej  personal  and  real,  etc.,  considered    under   the    idea   that 


32  THE   ALPHA   OF   MONEY 

business  must  take  its  own  risks  and  especially  that  exact  justice  must 
be  done  to  all,  as  nearly  as  possible,  and  protesting  against  constituting 
Government  or  the  power  of  the  law  as  an  active,  meddlesome  and  un- 
rewarded partner  for  the  purpose  of  furthering  the  particular  business 
of  any  man  or  association  of  men  at  the  expense  of  his  fellows. 

ISome  one  will  say  that  under  this  system  silver  and  gold  would  be 
subject  to  great  fluctuations  in  price  as  compared  with  each  other,  but 
this  idea  is  manifestly  erroneous.  If  one  should  be  higher  in  price  as 
compared  with  the  other  in  any  part  of  the  world  than  in  some  different 
place,  then  the  other  would  be  immediately  brought  in  and  ottered  for  sale 
for  the  profit  and  an  equilibrium  would  be  established  at  a  fairly  constant 
ratio  everywhere.  This  system  therefore  is  absolutely  automatic  and 
compensatory.  This  equivalence  everywhere  would  be  the  resultant  of 
the  world's  needs,  demands  and  uses,  influenced  by  natural  trade  law. 
This  ratio  would  be  subject  cnly  to  very  slight  local  fluctuations  be- 
tween well  defined  limits  which  would  be  governed  by  the  cost  of  trans- 
portation. 

Gold  for  many  reasons  would  be  the  more  valuable  money  and 
might  therefore  be  preferred  for  hoarding.  In  times  of  general  calam- 
ity, distrust,  alarm  and  confusion,  it  might  be  more  sought  for  than 
silver  on  occount  of  lighter  weight  for  equal  purchasing  power,  just  as 
diamonds  might  be  sought  for  the  reason. 

Diamond  fiowever  for  many  reasons  can  never  be  the  substance 
out  of  which  to  make  a  convenient  price  standard.  Nevertheless  dia- 
monds might  be  divided  into  shares  and  these  shares  circulated  by  to- 
kens representing  a  small  weight  of  diamond  which  weight  might  be 
declared  the  "unit  of  value,"  price  standard  or  money,  and  the  only  thing 
in  which  debt  could  be  expressed,  contracted  or  paid.  These  tokens 
might  be  declared  "legal  tender  for  all  debts  both  public  and  private  at 
their  nominal  value  except  where  otherwise  expressed  in  the  contract. 
And  if  these  tokens  were  of  gold  which  was  thereby  also  prevented  from 
competing  on  its  own  merit  as  money,  no  doubt  the  price  of  diamond 
would  rise  and  that  of  e-old  fall  as  compared  each  with  the  other,  add  to 
this  the  struggle  for  diamond  with  which  to  pay  ott  debt  and  the  fact  of 
the  constantly  accruing  interest  being  much  more  than  the  annual  sup- 
ply of  diamonds  or  produce  of  diamond  mines  and  you  will  have  a  state 
of  things  very  comfortable,  doubtless,  for  the  diamond  world,  and  no 
doubt  all  on  account  of  its  superior  and  peculiar  natural  "intrinsic" 
value.  Of  course  gold  mine  owners  would  be  the  only  people  affected 
and  therefore  no  attention  would  need  to  be  paid  to  their  -howl." 

Silver  is  thus  forced  to  suffer  and  be  sacrificed  for  the  short  comings 
of  gold.  It  has  not  only  been  robbed  of  its  natural  heritage  for  the  ben- 
fit  of  its  rival  but  has  also  been  made  a  slave  to  labor  unrewarded,  still 
further  to  increase  its  robber  master's  power  and  infiuence.  This  "nig 
ger"  in  the  fence  has  brought  about  the  decline  of  silver.  No  doubt  sil- 
ver would  have  been  ruined  altogether  were  it  not  upheld  by  the  fact 
that  many  nations  still  use  it  for  money  and  that  the  people  of  many 
others  would  do  so  if  not  prevented  by  arbitrary  legal  intervention. 

Is  is  time  that  this  injustice  should  cease,  surely  the  profits  have  al- 
ready been  enormous  enough.  AVhat  good  reason  is  there  to  show  that 
the  (iold  Trade  or  even  the  Money  Trade  should  be  given  strings  on  all 
the  world  with  whip  in  hand  to  drive  it  whithersoever  He  listeth.  Many 
arguments  have  been  brought  against  the  use  of  silver  as  money  be- 
cause it  is  reasonably  plentiful.  Why,  under  the  same  narrow  view, 
should  not  arguments  be  brought  against  gold  because  it  is  so  fearfully 
scarce  V 

It  is  no  part  of  the  business  of  the  government  to  protect  either  gold 
or  silver.  If  government  took  no  responsibilities  of  such  nature  upon 
itself  there  would  be  no  governmental  lamb  to  be  shorn,  no  people  to  be 
robbed,  for  the  benefit  of  an  arbitrary,  unreasonable,  and  unjust  theory  of 
commerce  and  especially  of  money.  The  monetary  sea  would  then  be- 
come a  quiescent  sort  of  a  quicksilver  ocean,  quick  to  find  it  level  every- 
where, at  a  certain  universal  ratio  which  could  not  easily  be  disturbed, 
and  if  disturbed  at  all  it  would  be  done  exceeding  slowly  and  gradually 
by  the  pouring  in  of  immense  amounts  of  gold  and  silver,  surprising  no- 
body. It  could  not  be  subject  to  be  torn  by  the  storms  and  tempests  of 
commerce.  In  fact  both  gold  and  silver  would  becomes  as  Mr.  Cleve- 
land says,  "stable  money,"  because  they  could  not  vary  much  in  price  as 
compared  with  each  other  after  they  had  settled  down  into  the  hollows 
that  they  would  seek  under  this  sensible  idea  of  free  trade  in  metals. 


THE   ALPHA   OF    MONEY  33 

There  is  nothing  in  tlie  constitution  of  the  United  States  to  prevent 
the  adoption  of  this  plan;  it  merely  says,  that  '"Congress  shall  have  the 
power  to  coin  gold  and  silver  and  regnlate  the  value  thereof  and  of  for- 
eign coins."  Which  "power"  of  regulation  may  be  allowed  to  drop  as 
many  other  old  one's  have  into  desuetude,  thereby  becoming  innocuous. 

The  article  is  not  at  all  mandatory.  If  it  should  be  objected  that 
platinum  and  other  metals  could  not  be  coined  under  this,  we  will  an- 
swer that  it  does  not  sav  that  they  shall  not  be  coined,  and  besides  we 
have  the  precedent  of  copper  coin  from  the  beginning,  and  nickel  later, 
so  there  would  be  no  trouble  on  that  score  or  any  other,  though  if  the 
article  had  simply  said,  "Congress  shall  have  power  to  coin  metals,"  it 
would  have  been  better. 

We  always  use  the  decimal  or  Arabic  system  of  numeration.  We 
cannot  help  it  for  it  has  become  universal,  and  it  is  always  a  great  ad- 
vantage to  have  our  weights  easily  expressed  in  terms  of  that  system, 
though  it  is  of  no  great  importance  that  different  denominations  should 
be  decimal  in  their  computation,  that  is  that  they  should  jump  by  tens. 
and  sometimes  it  is  a  great  disadvantage,  for  men  naturally  think  and 
compare  by  halves,  quarters,  etc.  There  is  no  benefit  in  decimating  our 
money  for  the  support  of  an  airy  fancy.  Though  of  course  the  import- 
ance and  benefits  of  a  universal  standard  weight  are  not  to  be  under  rated 
nor  understated,  and  it  would  be  manifestly  a  magnificent  thing,  and  is 
such,  but  it  does  not  matter  so  much  how  it  be  used  in  calculation  so  to 
accord  with  easy  computation  and  does  not  deal  in  long  decimals  and 
especially  not  in  continued  decimals. 

The  French  system  of  money,  or  rather  coinage,  is  not  frank,  at 
least  as  regards  the  metrical  system,  or  even  as  regards  the  decimal  or 
Arabic  system  of  computation,  or  we  would  have  inclined  to  take 
twenty-five  grammes  for  the  mintweight  and  proceed  upon  the  gramme 
system  which  would  have  been  just  as  easy  and  would  have  conformed 
our  coinage  system  and  metal  and  money  trade  to  the  gramme,  etc., 
rather  than  to  the  grain  and  ounce  troy.  The  weight  corresponding  to 
the  "karat"  of  this  article  would  have  been  one-fourth  gramme,  but  the 
French  made  their  five  franc  piece  of  silver  to  be  twenty-five  grammes 
of  standard  silver  9-10  fine  which  spoils  the  whole  theory.  They  also 
made  their  gold  franc  to  be  at  the  ratio  of  fifteen  and  one-half  to  one 
with  silver,  so  that  the  arrangement  altogetlier  is  destructive  of  any- 
thing like  a  system,  decimal  or  otherwise.  It  hurts  me  to  say  these 
things  for  I  have  ever  been  and  will  ever  be  an  ardent  lover  of  Fair 
France. 

There  is,  however,  one  great  concordance  in  their  coinage  and  ours; 
their  silver  as  well  as  their  gold  coins  are  nine-tenths  fine,  and  here  lies 
a  hope  of  unification  between  the  systems  of  the  United  States,  England 
and  France,  which  we  will  show  is  quite  possible  and  in  no  way  so  difii- 
cult  as  may  be  imagined. 

We  believe  that  the  grain  and  the  ounce  troy  are  more  universally 
used  in  the  metal  trade  than  the  gramme;  however,  the  battle  between 
the  grain  and  the  gramms  must  be  fought  later  if  at  all;  we  will  show 
the  steps  that  must  be  taken  before  that  question  comes  up. 

We  will  first  take  England  and  suppose  she  will  do  the  fair  thing, 
which  is  to  mint  a  coin  for  silver  as  she  does  for  gold  where  the  "title's 
but  the  guinea  stamp,  the  gold's  the  goud  for  a'  o'  that."  If  so  she  could 
adopt  our  mintweight,  karat  and  grain,  without  doing  herself  the  least 
violence.  Now  then  she  can  give  the  coin  corresponding  to  the  "Ar- 
gent" any  name  she  pleases,  if  she  did  not  like  the  tentative  one  which 
we  have  proposed,  she  might  call  it  a  "Lune"  from  "Luna"  and  the  cor- 
responding gold  coin  might  become  a  "Lion;"  hut  what's  in  a  name. 
Now  then  as  she  has  no  standard  silver  coin  she  can  just  as  well  make 
this  standard  coin  of  silv^^r  to  be  nine-tenths  fine  containing  400  grains  of 
pure  silver  and  proceed  for  the  rest  as  we  have  done  with  the  natural 
corresponding  differences  in  titles,  devices,  etc. 

Now  then  as  to  her  silver  shilling  tokens  for  gold;  she  must  not  issue 
any  more  but  must  coin  instead  a  token  of  nickel  steel  or  nickel  or  some 
easily  distinguishable  substance  and  of  about  the  size  of  a  British  shilling 
as  the  token  for  one-twentieth  of  a  pound  sterling,  to  be  issued  against 
exactly  this  amount  of  gold  actually  in  the  British  trdasury  for  its  redemp- 
tion, it  being  redeemable  always  on  demand,  and  she  will  gradually  retire 
the  silver  shilling  at  its  nominal  value. 

The  P>ritish  sovereign  of  full  weight  contains  exactly  113.001  377-(523ds 
grains  of  pure  g(jld  ;  for   practical   purposes  we  may  state  this  at  113 


84  THE   ALPHA    OF   MONEY 

grains  of  pure  gold  ;  multiply  this  by  three  and  one-half  and  we  have 
3951^  grains,  so  that  one  "Orent"  would  be  three  and  one-half  pound  ster- 
ling, plus  one  'Orat,"  plus  one-half  grain  of  gold.  Therefore  tvventy- 
eigJit  pounds  sterling  plus  nine  '"Orats"  would  equal  four  "Orents"  at 
which  ratio  tliese  coins  would  be  convertable  among  the  people  ;  or  £1 
sterling  or  113  grains  pure  gold  would  be  exactly  28I4  "Urats"  or  2i8.2i5 
"Orats"  or  .2825  "Orents."  liut  the  rule  of  the  British  mint  is  the  fol- 
lowing: twenty  pounds  weight  troy  of  standard  gold  which  is  ll-12ths 
hue  should  be  coined  into  974  sovereigns  and  one- half  sovereign, 
which  is  the  rate  at  which  Britain  is  to  pay  her  debts,  ex- 
pressed in  pounds.  All  legal  tender  laws  for  the  future  she  would  abol- 
ish. Should  she  elect  to  make  her  new  coinage  nine-tenths  line  as  is  ours 
and  that  of  France,  her  coins  would  be  interchangeable  by  weight  with 
those  of  the  United  .States  and  France,  provided  that  the  latter  should 
also  conform  to  the  same  theory  of  coinage;  that  is,  the  abolition  of 
token  silver  coins. 

At  the  United  States  mint  387  ounces  of  pure  gold  are  coined  into 
{$8,000  or  are  worth  eight  thosand  gold  dollars,  hence  an  ounce  of  pure 
gold  is  20.<i7 1834  plus  dollars,  the  numbeis  being  a  continual  fraction. 
Ninety-nine  ounces  of  pure  silver  are  128  silver  dollars.  Hence  one 
ounce  of  pure  silver  is  i.2V)2929  plus  silver  "dollars  of  our  dads,"  also  a 
continued  fraction.     Are  they  not  beautiful  numbers? 

An  ounce  of  pure  silver  never  was,  as  our  bi-metallic  men  say, 
one  dollar,  decimal  twenty-nine,  for  if  they  reckon  in  the  silver  it  was 
a  little  more,  and  if  in  the  gold  dollar  it  was  an  arbitrary  governmental 
price  mandate  and  not  a  true  trade  price.  If  they  reckon  in  gold  it 
never  has  been  worth  exactly  one  dollar  and  twenty-nine,  for  in  the  be- 
gHUiing  it  was  worth  considerably  more,  and  all  the  silver  left  the  coun- 
try as  fast  as  coined  in  obedience  to  the  expansion  of  Gresham's  sillily 
expressed  law  that  'bad  money  drives  out  good  money"  but  that  '-good 
money  cannot  drive  out  bad,"  which  but  means  that  sensible  men  take 
their  goods  to  the  best  market,  or  that  a  goldsmitli  melts  his  best  coins 
which  he  sells  by  weight,  and  passes  poor  ones  on  his  neighbor  as  they 
cost  him  the  same. 

Silver  was  considerably  undervalued  in  this  country  at  the  time  this 
ratio  was  declared  and  the  silver  coins  were  therefore  exported  to  better 
markets  and  only  gold  was  leit.  Hence  the  origin  of  tlie  subsidiary  sil- 
ver coins  whose  issuance  was  practically  a  demonetization  of  silver  ; 
this  together  with  the  large  product  of  the  mines  intiuenced  the  decline 
of  silver  which  was  considerably  more  marked  after  the  very  specific 
adoption  of  gold  as  the  '"unit  of  valne"  by  the  United  States  government 
in  the  year  1873,  such  decline  being  in  nowise  assuaged  by  the  law  of 
1878  providing  again  for  the  coinage  of  the  "dohar  of  oiir'dads"  which 
dollars  were  "a  legal  tender  at  their  nominal  value  for  all  dues  both  pub- 
lic and  private  except  where  otherwise  expressly  stipulated  in  the  con- 
tract."    A  legal  tender  for  what?     For  gold  of  course. 

Later  the  ounce  of  silver,  after  the  law  of  1878,  got  to  be  worth  con- 
siderably less  and  the  government  could  not  stand  the  pressure  of  bulling 
tiie  silver  market  and  therefore  limited  its  coinage,  which  is  only  in  de- 
gree dilferent  from  the  system  in  vogue  in  England.  The  friult  was  in 
the  attempt  of  the  United  States  to  keep  up  a  thoroughly  illogical 
"parity"  at  a  certain  iixed  price  with  a  single  gold  standard  which  pre- 
vented the  tise  of  one  of  these  metals  as  money  at  all. 

There  is. not,  nor  can  there  be.  any  such  thing  in  trade  as '-lixity  of 
value"  and  it  is  very  strange  that  the  great  free  trade  country  of  Eng- 
land with  her  great  statesmen  siiouid  be  pursuing  that  ignis  fatuii^ 
that  elusive  and  delusive  Will  o'  the  wisp,  that  unreal,  aereal  and 
ethereal  piiantom  known  as  ''fixity  of  value,"  trying  to  assure  and  insure 
it  for  this  one  commodity  of  gold  which  is  to  be  protected  and  preserved 
in  value,  and  enhanced  in  price,  wliile  all  others  are  to  be  left  to  shift 
for  themselves  unsheltered  from  the  winds  and  storms  of  commerce.  Is 
it  because  that  government  owes  all  to  the  dealer  in  gold  and  nothing  to 
other  men— nothing  to  the  worker,  the  thinker,  the  producer  V  Our 
good  British  brethren  and  ourselves  are  more  or  less  at  quits  when  it 
comes  to  just  and  sensible  ideas  of  commerce  for  they  have  their  own 
peculiar  advanced  British  policy  of  protection  by  special  legislation  to 
gold  or  the  immaculate  Britisli  system  of  gold  money  only,  while  we 
have  the  only  orginal  great  American  system  of  protection  by  robbery 
to  trade  a  daughter  of  the  same  original  plan  of  the  robbery  and  degra- 
dation of  the  many  for  the  benefit  of  the  favored  few. 


THE   ALPHA   OF   MO.YEY  35 

Anybody  knows  wlio  knows  anything  that  there  is  a  tremendous  de- 
mand in  the  world  tor  a  new  common  price  unit  or  money,  the  contracts 
for  the  delivery  of  gold  are  so  enormously  large,  and  the  available  sup- 
ply so  outrageously  small  that  some  such  arrangement  must  be  brouglit 
about  otherwise  we  will  have  universal  bankruptcy  in  enterprise,  or  en- 
slavement, or  repudiation. 

SOME   GOLD   MONEYS   OR   "UNITS   OF    VALUE,"   ETC. 

We  will  take  up  some  of  the  peerless  gold  units  of  account  so  much 
vaunted  by  the  philosophers  of  the  lands  where  they  originate. 

First  comes  the  lordly  pound  sterling,  the  sovereign  of  old  England. 
According  to  the  rule  of  the  l^)ritish  mint  twenty  pounds  weight  troy  of 
jiritish  standard  gold  which  is  ll-12th  tine  should  be  coined  into  954  sover- 
eigns and  one-half  sovereign.  Lf  you  perform  the  proper  operation 
which  is  to  divide  the  number  of  grains  in  twenty  pounds  troy  or  115,'.iOO 
grains  by  ll3f.5  the  result  will  be  123.27447  and  7785-9345,  or  319-623  which 
IS  tlie  number  of  grains  that  a  British  sovereign  ought  to  weigh.  It  is 
truly  a  beautiful,  abundant  and  ingenious  number. 

A  certain  famous  Hritish  economist  and  writer  on  money  (Jevons) 
said,  and  the  saying  is  often  repeated  and  quoted,  that  it  does  not  mat- 
ter whether  tlie  ordniary  Briton  knows  how  many  grains  there  are  in  a 
pound  01-  not. 

Of  coarse  this  knowledge  to  the  ordinary  laity  is  unnecessary.  He 
did  not  say  that  it  would  be  a  proof  of  a  fairly  liberal,  ordinary  educa- 
tion and  mental  attainment  to  discover  it  by  calculation  and  research. 
(Jf  course  it  is  entirely  unnecessary  that  the  man  who  lives  by  labor 
should  know  the  exact  weight,  composition,  and  nature  of  the  unit  of 
account,  of  that  substance,  for  which  he  barters  his  time  and  blood,  his 
life  and  vital  eiiergy,  the  unit  of  account  of  that  merchandise  which  he 
uses  as  an  agency  for  the  exchange  of  his  labor.  I  suppose  if  the  ordin- 
ary working  world  knew  these  things  perhaps  it  might  get  too  proud, 
know  too  much  about  money  and  begin  to  have  disagreeable  fool  theo- 
ries about  matters  that  are  no  part  of  its  business.  Of  course  these 
things  ought  to  be  known  to  the  great  banking  world  and  to  the  gold 
smith,  and  a  select  few— and  they  are. 

There  are,  as  will  be  easily  proved,  113.001  377-623  grains  of  pure 
gold  in  a  l^ritish  pound  which  is  also  a  beautiful  number.  The  opera- 
tu)n  is  indicated  as  follows,  multiply  115200:934.5  by  11-12.  We  will  not 
speak  of  the  Hritish  shilling  which  weighs  of  standard  silver  11-12  tine 
87.2727  grains,  it  is  characteristically  a  token  coin  representing  1-20  of  a 
pound  sterling. 

We  will  now  take  up  the  German  state-government-monopol5^-pro- 
tected-price-standard-unit,  or  money.  It  is  the  mark  consisting  of  6.1465- 
plus  grains  of  gold  of  the  tineness  of  nine  parts  in  ten.  The  principal 
coin  IS  the  twenty  mark  piece,  weighing  122.92  plus  grains  or  7.964954 
plus  grammes  and  containing  7.168459plus  grammes  of  pure  gold. 

The  sovereign  of  England  contains  7.3224plus  grammes  of  pure  gold 
and  the  twenty-tive  gold  franc  piece  of  France  will  contain  7.2581plus 
grammes. 

Austria  and  some  other  countries  use  coins  exactly  like  the  French 
in  v/eight  but  with  ditferent  names. 

So  we  have  reviewed  the  moneys  of  account  and  coins  of  these  great 
nations  and  we  tind  nothing  to  praise  nor  admire,  except,  perhaps,  the 
apparent  ingenuity  that  has  been  displayed  in  making  them  unintelligi- 
ble or  unlike  what  they  should  be. 

The  (xerman  system  is  remarkable  for  nothing  brilliant,  the  French 
system  dtjes  not  mete  with  the  metric  system  of  weights,  or  with  the 
gramme,  nor  the  English  system  square  with  the  grain;  as  to  the  origi- 
nal American  dollar,  the  word  was  intended  to  mean  a  certain  imagin- 
ary (ixed  value  represented  by  a  certain  quantity  of  gold  or  by  a  cer- 
tain different  fixed  quantity  of  silver.  The  word  dollar  as  used  there 
was  a  verbal  surd  and  the  systems  founded  on  it  have  been  dolorously 
absurd.  But  the  dollar  now  among  us  has  been  declared  to  be  the  gold 
dollar,  and  has  the  advantage  of  stopping  at  two  decimal  places  when 
expressed  in  grains,  which  is  much  more  than  any  of  its  kingly  confreres 
can  do  when  expressed  in  grains,  grammes,  or  any  other  definite  standard 
weight.  It  consists  of  exactly,  or  rather  contains,  23.22  grains  of  pure 
gold.  Is  it  altogether  a  wonder  thai;  we  are  called  upon  to  fall  down 
and  worship   these  complicated  and  mysterious  systems  and  units  of 


36  THE   ALPHA   OF   MONEY 

trade?  The  propaganda  can  urge  upon  us  that  these  numbers  or  quan- 
tities are  not  the  likeness  of  anything  that  is  in  Heaven  above  or  is  in 
the  Earth  beneath,  or  is  in  the  waters  beneath  the  Earth.  (Deut.  Chap. 
5,  verse  8.)  On  the  other  hand  why  are  we  at  the  same  time  asked  to 
bow  in  blind  obeisance  to  the  Golden  Calf,  which  by  special  protection 
and  governmental  and  legal  intervention  has  become  the  sacred  stalled 
ox  in  tlie  religion  of  modern  commerce,  a  sort  of  a  relative  to  that  old 
god  of  old  politics  known  as  the  Balance  of  Trade. 

A  money  may  be  or  ought  to  be  regarded  in  all  countries,  where 
trade  is  carried  on  extensively,  as  a  valuable  measured  merchandise 
which  is  used  also  as  a  common  price  standard  and  thereby  varying 
quantities  of  it  become  a  medium  of  exchange.  That  is,  a  man  barters 
something  for  a  certain  amount  of  money.  He  then  takes  his  money 
and  barters  it  for  some  other  thing  or  things,  whereby  we  have  the  trite 
and  iiidetinite  definition  of  'money  is  a  medium  of  exchange."  It 
thereby  makes  a  division  of  labor  possible.  As  it  would  naturally  also 
be  bartered  for  labor,  it  thereby  becomes  a  store  of  value,  a  sort  of  a 
charged  battery  of  available  power,  and  from  this  comes  the  idea  of 
"capital"  which  is  a  more  or  less  large  battery  of  available  power  ac- 
cording to  its  number  of  units  of  force  measured  by  the  unit  of  force 
in  the  price  standard.  Price  is  an  exchange  numerator,  always  divided 
by  unity,  which  is  the  unit  of  value  or  price  denominator  or  rather 
price  unit  or  price  standard  or  common  denominator  of  at  least  that 
particular  exchange.  The  transfer  of  credits  still  further  facilitates  ex- 
change and  brings  about  more  perfect  barter,  but  this  sort  of  credit  is 
not  wind,  by  any  means,  and  let  no  man  think  for  a  moment  that  it  if. 
Any  other  valuable  merchandise  is  a  charged  battery  of  power,  but  it 
must  be  converted  into  money  to  make  it  available.  Money  is  affected 
by  the  law  of  demand  and  supply,  just  as  any  other  merchanaise  is.  Con- 
tracts for  delivery  make  it  scarce  and  high  as  compared  with  otlier  prop- 
erty. Money  need  not  be  the  sanie  tiling  in  one  place  that  it  is  in 
another.  If  there  be  a  convenience  or  profit  to  a  community  in  using 
a  certain  money  rather  than  some  other,  people  will  quickly  and  insen- 
sibly lind  it  out  and  adopt  it.  Let  them  be  free,  therefore,  to  act  accord- 
ingly. Therefore,  let  no  merchandise  or  commodity  be  appointed  by 
(Government  for  the  special  privilege  of  being  the  only  thing  out  of 
which  the  price  standard  or  unit  of  value  or  money,  sliall  be  made. 
Let  us  have  no  mystery  about  money,  no  crown,  no  knighthood,  no  no- 
bility, except  what  may  be  natural;  no  halo,  no  smoke,  no  jugglery,  no 
black  art,  no  peculiar  "intrinsic"  power. 

As  to  representative  money  or  rather  representatives  of  money,  let 
people  make  as  much  as  they  please,  but  let  no  man  be  forced  to  take  it 
for  what  it  pretends  to  represent.  That  is,  no  general  legal  tender  laws 
are  needed,  no  tokens,  brass,  paper,  nor  silver,  to  be  forced  upon  anyone. 
No  "regulation"  of  any  "currency."  No  special  protection  to  "banking," 
so  called,  or  rather  credit  straining,  state  nor  national.  Let  commerce 
alone  to  take  care  of  herself,  and  to  take  her  own  risks  and  we  would 
have  no  bubbles  to  burst.  We  want  no  regulation  further  than  an  in- 
sistence upon  common  and  exact  honesty  in  every  proceeding. 

GOVERNMENT,    ETC. 

Let  all  the  branches  of  commercial  government  spring  from  the 
limb,  "Thou  shalt  not  steal"  nor  help  the  other  fellow  at  it,  which  Uieans 
exact  justice  to  all;  in  order  that  this  limb  may  flourish,  it  must  be 
cheered,  nourished  and  encouraged  by  the  warmth  and  light  of,  "Thou 
shalt  not  bear  false  witness"  nor  stand  in  with  any  scoundrelly  systems 
of  (iovernment  and  law  that  do.  The  trunk  ot  this  tree  is:  "Thou 
shalt  love  the  Lord  thy  God  with  all  thy  heart  and  thy  neighbor  as  thy- 
self." "Upon  these  two  hang  all  the 'law  and  the  prophets,"  and  the 
science  of  Government  and  Political  Economy  as  well  as  all  other 
sciences. 

Possibly  one  reason  why  Governments  intermeddle  so  in  the  money 
business  mav  be  that  men  imagine  that  money  is,  or  should  be,  the 
"stamp  of  the  Government,"  wliich,  by  this  laying  on  of  hands  gives 
commercial  power,  to  what  in  their  minds  should  otherwise  be 
worthless. 

Let  us  remember  that  we  can  be  tyrannized  over  by  immaterial  sys- 
tems called  laws,  \s'hen  not  founded  upon  e(iuity  and  right  between  man 
and  man,  almost,  if  not  quite  as  effectually  as  by  material  beings  given 


THE   ALPHA    OF   MONEY  37 

the  power  of  irresponsible  despots.  In  fact  tlieSie  latter  must  use  the 
former  for  such  accomplishment,  together  with  henchmen  scoundrels 
ready  to  stoop  in  cowardly  obedience  to  iniquitous  power,  and  when 
they  have  power  ready  to  use  the  same  is  the  cause  of  iniquity.  They 
are  the  powers  of  darkness,  the  children  of  tlie  devil.  In  a  democracy  of 
universHl  suffrage  we  will  have  laws  and  a  Government  pretty  nearly 
good  enough  for  us. 

We  have,  fortunately,  in  our  hands  the  power  of  change,  which 
throws  upon  us  the  duty  of  investigation  and  search  for  the  true  princi- 
ples that  should  underlie  the  science  of  Government,  and  our  scholars 
are  morally  bound  to  search  for  them,  and  all  our  people  to  know  the 
results  of  such  research  if  they  be  reasonably  obtainable. 

We  have  no  right  to  arraign  any  set  of  meu  simply  because  they 
may  have  prolited  by  the  ills  that  may  have,  through  law,  befallen  the 
majority  of  our  people.  The  evil  lies  in  our  legislation.  The  cause  is 
against  our  electors  and  legislators.  The  fault  is  with  our  systems  of 
laws  founded  on  wrong  principles,  or  lies  in  the  ignorance,  incompe- 
tence, or  possibly  m  some  instances  with  the  scoundrelism  of  our  legis- 
lators which,  of  course,  makes  it  our  duty  never  on  any  account  to  vote 
for  a  tricky  man  of  any  party  for  any  legislative  position.  Under  the 
Australian  ballot  s>stem  none  of  our  electors  will  find  it  difficult  to  com- 
ply with  this  duty  of  a  freeman.  Political  indilference  is  a  crime  against 
the  public. 

The  unreasoning  and  unchristian  howl  that  is  beinsr  raised  against 
the  Jews  is  the  veriest  of  sloppy  bosh  and  nonsense.  If  some  of  our 
Hebrew  brethren  have  greatly  prohted  througfi  the  special  protection 
given  to  money  and  especially  to  gold,  it  is  only  an  evidence  of  the  fact 
that  they  knew  a  good  thing  when  they  saw  it,  and  it  is  certainly 
no  more'tlian  a  compliment  to  their  business  sagacity  that  they  en- 
gaged in  the  business  that  offered  the  surest  return  for  large  operations, 
'rruly  there  is  no  fault  to  be  found  in  them  for  that. 

But  let  not  the  Jews,  as  a  whole,  think  that  it  Is  to  their  interest  that 
this  gold  money  special  protection  should  be  encouraged  and  continued. 
They  can  not  all  be  great  loafers  round  the  thrones  of  the  world.  Their 
business,  as  a  class,  I  nnderstaiid  to  be  trade,  a  laborious  and  lionorable 
occnpation  in  itself,  which  will  flourish  always  with  general  prosperity, 
and  which  is  held  back,  retarded,  and  made  difhcult  ana  hazardous  more 
by  this  gold  protection  than  any  other  one  thing.  Already  many  of 
them  know,  to  their  sorrow,  that  the  gold  iish  are  swallowing  the  Vest. 
It  is  certainly  to  their  interest  to  have  a  just  and  equitable  system  of 
coinage,  the  natural  consequence  of  a  tree  choice  theory  oif  money. 
These  remarks  apply  also  to  legitimate  banking. 

We  have  mIso  had  large  protected  manufacturers,  protected  rail  road 
builders,  corporations,  and  other  things  which  may  have  flourished  by 
fleecing  the  general  public.  AVhen  we  go  to  investigate  these  things,  we 
must  do  it  in  a  spirit  of  fairness,  and  for  the  purpose  of  getting  '-onto 
the  combination,"  which,  when  we  do,  and  hud  that  any  of  it  is  founded 
upon  injustice,  we  should  immediately  proceed  to  show  how  to  remedy 
it;  if  it  is  a  legal  or  governmental  privilege  as  may  be  in  corporations, 
we  will  very  likely  give  this  privilege  equally  to  the  other  fellow  or  take 
it  away  from  His  Ethereality,  who  has  no  body  to  be  kicked  nor  soul  to 
be  damned. 

We  propose  that  Columbia  shall  give  her  meat  babies  a  fair  show 
and  to  investigate  the  subject  under  the  idea  that  no  association  of  men 
shall.be  given  privileges  that  would  be  denied  to  a  single  individual, 
that  no  system  or  manner  of  conducting  business,  should  be  specially 
protected  by  legal  invervention.  (Government  should  do  exact  justice 
between  man  and  man,  and  by  the  term  man,  woman  must  of  course  be 
included.  The  rights  of  one  half  of  mankind  are  greatly  abridged 
simply  because  they  happen  to  be  female  men.  We  may  be  one  of  those 
unfortunates  who  are  possessed  of  far  more  spirit  than  power,  but  our 
services,  such  as  they  be,  are  at  the  disposal  of  our  fair  brethren,  and  we 
may  at  some  time  take  up  the  dagger  in  their  defense,  which,  if  we  do, 
we  will  employ  all  our  feeble  energies  in  the  effort  to  drive  it  to  the  hilt, 
into  the  bosoni  of  man's  inhumanity  to  woman.  But  we  are  battling  now 
against  the  money  tyranny,  and  one  such  struggle  at  a  time  is  enough. 
Governments  have  debts  to  pay  and  they  are  to  be  discharged,  if  possi- 
ble, according  to  the  letter  of  the  contract,  and  any  thing  else  would 
probably  be  repudiation,  partial  or  complete,  as  the  case  might  be. 

Towards  that  the  world,  under  the  single  gold  standard,  is  enevita- 
bly  tending,  for  the  way  gold  debts  are  piling  up,  with  interest,  accruing, 


38  THE   ALPHA   OF   MONEY 

simply  means  that  they  never  can  be  paid  under  that  standard,  except  by 
the  absorbtion  of  the  rest  of  the  wealth  of  the  world  as  well.  It  means 
either  the  enslavement  of  mankind,  or  at  least,  of  the  wealth  of  the  na- 
tions; or  perhaps  anarchy,  revolt,  universal  repudiation,  and  it  m^y  be 
blood-slied.  A  large  paiL  of  the  world  is  already  held  under  a  system  of 
peonage  by  this  universal  task  master.  Governments  and  legislators 
must  and  should  be  ever  mindful  of  the  fact  that  national  debts  must 
be  paid  with  national  blood.  This  language  is  not  at  all  tigurative  nor 
bloodthirsty.  It  means  exactly  what  it  says;  that  is,  that  national  debts 
must  be  paid  through  the  use  and  consumption  of  national  blood,  the 
vital  energies  and  wealth  of  the  nation. 

This  money  which  in  nearly  all  the  w^orld  must  be  gold,  is  a  fruit  and 
contribution  from  the  labor  and  industry  of  the  nation,  which  is  all  pro- 
duced and  sustained  through  the  palpitating  hearts  of  millions  of  man- 
kind. The  question  is:  ilow  easiest  shall  the  delivery  of  this  gold  be 
brought  about  y  How  may  we  honorably  obtain  the  highest  price  for 
this  blood,  the  greatest  reward  for  the  use  of  this  vital  energy?  It  is 
the  life  blood  of  civihzation  and  true  Government.  It  is  the  wealth  of 
the  nation. 

Can  the  payment  best  be  made  by  continuing  what  we  consider  the 
arbitrary,  illogical,  despotic,  cruel  and  inhuman  protected  single  gold 
standard,  mucn  bepraised  though  it  may  beV  We  think  not,  and  have 
proposed  what  we  believe  to  be  a  just,  free,  logical  and  humane  theory 
of  money  and  system  of  coinage,  which  we  think  should  be  put  into 
practice  as  soon  as  possible.  Everything  that  goes  away  from  it  is  a 
fraud,  a  robbery  and  a  humbug.  ]S'o  laws  not  founded  upon  the  princi- 
ples of  truth  and  justice  ought  to  stand.  The  wealth  of  tiie  nation— that 
sacred  trust  in  the  hands  ot  our  legislators— is  not  to  be  spilled,  wasted 
nor  robbed  by  arbitrary  laws  of  special  protection  by  liobber  liarn.  the- 
ories of  trade. 

We  would  like  to  lay  down  here  what  we  conceive  to  be  some  fund- 
amental principles  in  the  science  of  government  and  political  economy 
which  we  proclaim  to  be,  as  a  science,  as  true  and  as  absolutely  demon- 
strable as  any.  Of  course  to  capably  constituted  minds  there  is  no  use 
in  casting  pearls  before  swine.  It  rests  upon  truths  more  eternal  than 
the  rock  ribbed  hills  for  they  are  rays  from  the  light  of  which  those  hills 
were  made.  These  truths  are  as  inexorable  as  beneticent  and  as 
exact  as  the  laws  of  God  of  which  they  in  deed  must  be  part  if  they  be 
truths  at  all.  These  laws  can  never  be  countervailed  with  impunity. 
They  cannot  be  broken  at  all. 

But  the  statement  and  development  of  one  or  two  of  those  truths 
would  require  more  space  than  had  been  taken  in  this  essay,  and  a  tre- 
mendous effort  of  mental  power,  perhaps  a  greater  than  the  writer  is 
capable  of  exerting,  besides  times,  which  we  have  not  yet  devoted  to  the 
subject. 

After  the  subject  of  money  would  no  doubt  come  that  of  all  trade 
and  industry,  and  we  would  clearly  define  what  we  meant  by  all  these 
words.  Production  we  should  divide  into  production  and  "carriage." 
We  would  attempt  to  show  how  and  where  taxes  should  be  collected  and 
correctly  dev^^lop  the  whole  theory  of  taxation,  debt  and  collection.  AVe 
would  show  that  the  consumer  pays  all  of  the  cost  of  production  and 
carriage  every  time.  Taxes,  tariff  and  interest  are  part  of  carriage,  ^\e 
would  show  what  a  good  fellow  the  consumer  is  every  time  and  would 
be  careful  to  tell  exactly  who  he  was.  No  consumption,  no  production. 
We  would  show  that  the  consumer  is  a  producer  every  time  if  he  pays 
his  bills,  therefore  just  as  good  a  fellow  as  the  other  felfow,  both  of  them 
are  equally  good  fellows  when  neither  is  unjustly  favored  by  law.  We 
would  show  the  equation  balances  every  time. 

It  would  show  that  under  any  proper  theory  of  trade  and  money, 
balance  of  trade  as  an  advantage  is  a  humbug 'every  time.  It  would 
show  that  profits  as  something  made  of  nothing,  is  nonsense;  they  are 
but  pay  for  labor,  efforts,  ability,  sagacity  or  advantages.  It  would 
show  that  a  Nation  cannot  lift  itself  up  by  its  boot  straps,  nor  by  sim- 
ple fiat  add  one  cubit  to  its  stature— it  takes  works.  It  would  show  that 
the  wealth  of  the  Nation,  or  the  body  politic,  cannot  be  bled  any  where 
without  weakening  it.  It  would  show  that  the  true  happiness  of  man- 
kind is  a  proper  subject  for  scientific  investigation,  and  a  good  thing  to 
increase.  It  would  show  cheaper  production  and  carriagje,  a  great  ben- 
efit to  mankind,  more  happiness  for  the  same  effort.  If  the  rule  works 
in  every  other  commodity,   why  not  in  the  money  business?    It  will. 


THE    ALPHA   O?"   MONEY  39 

Why  ?  Cheaper  production  does  not  mean  smaller  reward  for  labor,  but 
quite  the  contrary.  Why?  It  will  show  that  "brain"  and ''brawn"  are 
tne  same  or  ditterent  manifestations  of  the  same,  and  must  stand  in 
with  each  other  every  time,  and  whyV  It  would  show  a  great  many 
other  things,  and  no  statistics  needed.  It  would  contain  a  chapter  on 
statistics  and  show  that  a  weekly  report  or  table  of  the  markets  of  New 
York,  showing  the  price  equivalent  of  all  merchandise  referred  to  a  con- 
stant amount  oy  weight  or  otherwise  of  any  one  of  them  would  be  valu- 
able to  the  Econoniico'Folitist  as  showing  the  waves  tides  and  currents  of 
commerce  through  lengths  of  time.  We  hope  that  we  would  get  beyond 
tiiose  old  ideas  of  tribal  ferocity  and  show  that  Governments  should 
count  souls  not  stations.  It  would  cast  to  the  winds  the  fallacies  of  low 
browed  philosophers  whose  minds  like  their  souls  are  close  to  the  earth 
and  whose  mental  and  moral  horizon  is  necessarily  extremely  limited. 

The  whole  question  of  trade  after  strict  justice  to  man  and  man 
comes  down  to  economy  of  force,  which  will  bring  the  greatest  good  to 
the  greatest  number,  the  greatest  return  for  this  wealth  of  the  nation. 
The  most  happiness  for  the  power  expended  giving  to  every  man  his 
just  due  and  allowing  the  right  freely  to  obtain  the  reward  that  belongs 
to  him  for  iiis  talents  and  industay  and  protection  in  all  that  is,  of  right, 
his.  This  does  not  mean  but  that  many  men  must  get  rich  and  many 
more  remain  poor.  There  is  no  equality  in  it  except  equality  of  right. 
After  the  aivine  law  of  justice,  and  which  is,  when  properly  understood,  a 
part  of  it,  comes  in  the  law  of  the  survival  of  tiie  littest  and  it  by  no 
means  controverts  the  theory  of  design  in  the  first  Great  Cause,' but 
is  rather  a  proof  of  it.  How  would  it  sound  to  say  the  "survival  of  the 
untittestV"  Our  Christianity  must  be  made  broad  and  high.  We  must 
look  from  Nature  up  to  Nature's  God  and  trace  the  word  in  the  book  of 
of  nature  and  of  morals.  • 

Klmd,  unreasoning  humility  and  obedience  were  never  taught  by 
Christ,  nor  did  He  counsel  the  swallowing  of  camels,  nor  was  He  that 
"meek  and  lowly"  that  has  been  so  often  pictured.  He  taught  freedom, 
not  slavery,  and  in  the  great  sense  He  may  be  called  the  grandest 
Rebel  of  all  time.  He  rebelled  against  wrong  and  strove  for  the  right 
in  the  cause  of  that  "truth  that  shall  make  ye  tree."  His  true  followers 
whether  within  or  without  the  nominal  pale  of  a  creed,  have  ever  done 
the  same,  or  approached  thereunto.  These  be  doers  of  the  word,  the 
salt  of  the  earth,  for  its  preservation,  the  light  of  the  world  for  its  guid- 
ance, wisdom  and  redemption.  Their  innocent  blood  has  been  strewn 
on  the  pathway  of  the  centuries.  Their  holy  steadfastness  has  lighted 
the  darKiiess  of  the  ages,  their  anguish  and  patient  suffering  has  been 
wafted  to  the  throne  of  the  Eternal,  and  1  believe,  that  verily  they  shall 
have  their  reward.  It  is  a  pity  that  so  many  saints  should  have  been 
thrown,  without  sympathy,  out  upon  their  own  resources,  to  be  reviled 
and  despitefully  used  of  men,  tor  begging  for  reason,  for  asking  for 
rights,  and  for  pleading  for  the  liberty  of  mankind. 

if  we  are  to  have  cunning,  rascally  laws— or  laws  founded  on  mis- 
taken principles,  or  that  in  their  operation  tend  more  or  less  to  protect 
fraud,  chicanery  or  inhumanity,  we  will  hnd  that  the  survival  of  the 
fittest  will  be  the  survival  of  the  tricky,  the  cowardly  and  the  dishonest. 
It  would  be  to  the  prejudice  of  the  noble,  the  industrious  and  the  brave 
and  to  the  mental,  moral  and  physical  deterioration  of  the  race,  the 
retardation  and  the  kingdom  of  peace.  A  great  many  laws  that  we 
have  now^  are  of  such  description  and  tendency,  and  good  business  qual- 
ifications too  often  include  in  some  minds  a  liberal  supply  of  cunning 
roguery,  often  miscalled  smartness.  Is  it  not  because  such  qualifica- 
tions, under  the  trade  system  and  laws  of  to-day,  tend  to  make  a  man 
successful,  as  a  gainer  of  wealth?  If  so,  the  cause  of  such  evil  must  be 
ferreted  out  and  remedied  as  far  as  possible  by  establishing  the  proper 
interpretation  of  true  Government  and  by  making  laws  in  conformity. 
If  precedent  stands  in  the  way,  so  much  the  worse  for  precedent ;  it  is 
not  much  of  an  argument  anyhow  in  fact  it  is  no  argument  at  all.  If 
we  have  laws  founded  on  the  eternal  principles  of  truth  we  would  find 
that  the  survival  of  the  fittest  would  be  the  survival  of  the  good,  the 
true,  and  the  beautiful,  the  kind,  the  loving,  the  strong,  the  brave,  the 
steadfast,  the  honorable,  the  honest,  the  wise. 

In  the  consideration  of  Government,  a  distinction  should  be  made  be- 
tween government  as  the  national  cooperative  agent,  and  the  laws  that 
should  restrain  the  evil  and  guide  the  actions  of  men,  define  their  inalien- 


40  THE   ALPHA   OF   MONEY 

able  rights  and  attempt  to  insure  the  true  liberty  of  man,  woman  and 
child.  We  would  show  that  laws  are  part  of  government  and  must 
spring  from  the  trunk  that  we  have  meniioned  before,  (jlovernmg  in 
tlie  narrow  sense  with  wiiich  it  i.s  generally  or  at  least  very  often  used  is 
not  near  so  much  tiie  true  business  of  government  as  some  myy  nnaguie. 

We  have  strayed  away  from  our  subject  and  will  come  bjick  by  re- 
marking that  though  we  liave  only  mentioned  public  or  national  debts 
there  are  other  large  ones  far  exceeding  tlie  former  in  amount,  winch, 
when  properly  reviewed  are,  in  character,  essentially  the  same.  'J'hese 
are  ov\ed  by  large  corporations  and  secured  by  vast  amounts  of  property 
placed  in  pawn  througii  the  medium  of  bonds.  It  follows  naturally  that 
if  paid  at  all  they  must  be  paid  like  the  others. 

Here  is  a  chance  tor  the  railroads  and  the  farmers  to  stand  together 
for  here  their  interests  are  surely  mutual.  We  imagine  that  a  lobby 
made  up  of  the  bonded  interests  of  tlie  country  and  working  in  the  cause 
of  truth  and  justice  would  not  be  devoid  of  iniluence.  The  adoption  of 
this  true  theory  of  money  would  make  the  agricultural  and  transport a- 
tion  industries  of  the  country  vastly  more  valuable  than  they  are  now, 
and  would  be  but  doing  simple  jusiice— swindling  nobody.  It  would  be 
of  vast  beneht  to  mankind  and  to  any  and  all  legitimate  interests. 

It  costs  sometlung  to  cut  saw  logs  up  in  merchantable  lumber,  to 
grind  wheat  into  Hour,  to  dissolve  metal  aiioys,  mixed  perhaps  with  iin- 
puriiies,  and  separate  them  into  their  components  as  chemically  pure 
metals,  something  to  again  mix  these  metals  into  an  exact  coinage  alloy, 
and  jjgam  something  to  convert  these  masses  of  alloy  into  pieces  of  exact 
weight  and  to  stamp  them  into  clear  and  beautiful  coins;  and  at  present 
I  cannot  see  why  this  trusted  rehner  weigher  and  stamper  should  not  be 
paid  by  tiie  person  for  whom  he  performs  these  services.  However 
ihere  may  be  argumenls  founded  on  public  policy  which  would  show 
why  this  may  or  should  properly  be  a  public  charge.  We  have  not  in- 
vestigated this  subject  deeply,  considering  it  of  intinitely  smail  import- 
ance in  comparison  with  others  which  have  been  treated  here  aim  are 
before  the  people,  therefore  it  may  be  properly  laid  over  for  future  con- 
sideration. 

Our  method  of  coinage  denomination  is  often  called  a  decimal  sys- 
tem, but  it  is  not  a  decimal  system.  I  think  it  could  be  called  a  bi-quin- 
quenary  system;  anyhow  it  cannot  be  improved  upon  as  long  as  men 
tliink  in  halves,  count  by  tens,  and  often  compute  in  hundreds,  thous- 
ands, etc.  Our  French  friends  will  try  in  vain  to  improve  upon  it.  Our 
English  friends  ought  to  adopt  it  for  1  think  it  can  be  reduced  to  a  the- 
orem and  proved  to  a  mathematical  certainty  that  it  is  the  proper  sys- 
tem for  the  case.  It  conforms  itself  perfectly  to  the  decimal  system  of 
numeration  and  the  centesimal  one  of  computation  as  well  as  to  the  bi- 
nary one  of  natural  comparison. 

The  theory  of  money  here  advocated  has  never  been  given  a  name. 
It  might  be  called  the  free  standard,  or  free  money  theory  or  free  mon- 
etism,  or  perhaps  free  metallism  as  we  already  have  monometaiism  and 
bi-metallism.  Will  our  bi-inetallic  friends  tell  us  how  to  expand  their 
theory  into  tri-metallism  V  This  theory  of  coinage  might  be  called  the 
equitable  system  of  coinage  and  the  table  before  given  is  founded  on 
this  equitable  theory.  Of  course  any  other  weiglits  mav  be  used  but  the 
merals  are  all  to  be  treated  alike  by  weight  and  dealt  with  by  an  equal 
hand  and  according  to  the  same  cohiage  rule.  This  theory  of  money 
and  coinage  allows  men  to  choose  the  money  they  please.  '  Is  not  that 
just,  fair,  honest  and  equitable? 

They  are,  therefore,  under  this  system,  at  liberty  in  the  pursuit  of 
happiness,  to  choose  the  money  tliat  siiall  be  the  most  convenient  for 
theai  (U"  to  :heir  greater  profit  or  advantage  to  use.  No  le^al  tender 
force  bill,  tyrannical  government  goods,  nor  protected  unit  of  value  is 
needed  or  insisted  upon  in  this  commerce.  Men  are  to  be  left  free  in 
this  respect.     If  this  be  the  land  of  the  free  why  make  it  soV 

If  the  money  they  owe  or  tlie  contracts  for  the  delivery  of  a  certain 
metal  make  a  great  demand  for  it  and  force  its  price  too  high  to  use  with 
economy,  as  money,  let  them  do  business  on  any  money  that  they  please 
until  they  be  able  to  get  the  dear  metal  at  a  clieaper  or  more  reasonable 
rate.  There  is  nothing  wrong  in  this  idea.  This  argument  for 
cheap  money  is  all  right.'  A  cheap  money  here  means  a  money  in  which 
there  is  true  economy  in  using.  It  does  not  necessarily  mean  a  low 
priced  or  useless  money  and  may  mean  very  much  the  contrary.    It  does 


THE   ALPHA    OF   MONEY  41 

not  mean  a  money  worthless  in  itself,  for  sucli  would  be  of  little  use  in 
trade.  If  cheapening  steel  by  Bessemer  was  such  a  blessing,  why  should 
not  cheaper  gold  beV  If  you  get  a  good  coat  cheap  it  is  no  sign  that  you 
are  a  cheap  man.  It  may  be  on  the  contrary  rather  a  sign  that  you  are 
neither  a  slave  nor  a  fool.  Do  not  forget  that  it  is  needs,  wants,  and 
especially  special  use  that  makes  demand.  Fish  go  blind  in  the  Mam- 
moth Cave.    Don't  want  eyes  ;  no  special  use  for  them. 

However  false  in  themselves,  it  is  difficult  for  a  man  to  break  up 
ideas,  with  which  his  braiu  has  been  sodden  from  infancy  and  the  minds 
of  hundreds  of  ancestors  have  been  steeped  for  ages,  for  this  may  add 
something  of  the  force  of  heredity  to  the  impression,  and  something  of 
such  difficulty  is  found  in  convincing  through  argument  like  the  present. 
It  is  only  by  the  investigation  of  such  set  impressions,  and  the  breaking 
away  from  them  when  they  be  wrong,  that  men  have  raised  themselves 
in  the  scale  of  intelligence  and  have  advanced  science,  civilization  and 
religion. 

1  will  ask  the  reader  to  step  carefully  from  the  beginning,  to  be  sure 
that  all  the  stages  of  his  own  reasoning  be  correct  and  that  he  carefully 
analyze  every  conclusion  to  see  if  it  be  just,  logical  and  well  founded, 
and  every  base  to  see  that  it  be  solid.  We  must  remember  that  the 
world  is  not  with  us  in  this  idea,  but  that  is  no  proof  that  we  are  wrong. 

It  is  not  so  long  ago  that  the  liberty  of  conscience  was  universally  de- 
nied or  contined  and  we  are  not  yet  altogether  free  from  vestiges  of  this  in 
private  life,  though  the  advanced  thought  of  the  age  has  gone  far  beyond. 
It  is  felt  by  a  large  part  of  the  world  respecting  the  money  question  that 
something"  is  wrong  somewhere.  May  be  we  are  right  and  have  made 
a  rift  in  the  cloud  of  mystery  and  gloom  that  overshadows  the  monetary 
thought  of  the  world,  that  may  yet  clear  it  away  and  bathe  the  whole  in 
light.  Political  freedom  without  monetary  freedom  can  not  exist.  That 
we  have  a  large  share  of  personal  liberty  and  no  monetary  liberty,  in  my 
opinion,  shows  that  Truth  is  yet  far  from  having  done  her  perfect  work. 
The  material  welfare  of  mankind  is  of  more  importance  than  Govern- 
ment generally  has  understood. 

The  words  franc,  mark  and  dollar  are  still  used  for  both  gold  and 
silver  coins.  England  has  not  even  deigned  to  admit  that  silver  could  or 
should  be  used  as  money  at  all  and  in  fact  or  at  least  in  policy  declares 
that  gold  shall  be  the  protected  universal  raw  material  out  of  which 
price  standard  shall  be  made  and  in  which  debts  must  be  expressed  and 
contracted.  What  the  British  Government  has  to  gain  by  it,  or  Germany, 
who  has  adopted  the  same  view%  cannot  be  imagined.  We  have  shown 
that  it  is  simply  a  matter  for  the  free  choice  of  mankind  and  an  affair 
with  which  Government  need  not  and  ought  not  to  have  anything  to  do 
whatsoever. 

Although  this  was  conceived  with  deliberation  it  was  written  hur- 
riedly, badly  arranged,  and  much  that  would  perhaps  have  been  greatly 
to  the  purpose  omitted;  still  it  is  believed  that  sound  fundamental  prin- 
ciples have  been  here  expressed.  It  was  not  the  intent  of  the  author  to 
enter  into  controversy,  but  to  turn  the  thoughts  of  men  into  new  and 
what  we  believe  to  be  true  channels. 

It  is  hoped  that  this  may  place  the  subject  upon  sound,  simple  and 
easily  understood,  scientilic  principles,  where  the  minds  of  men  may 
grasp  it  without  being  lost  in  clouds  of  fallacy  and  mazes  of  sophistry 
and  by  this  means  eventually  discover  the  true  theory  of  money  and 
adopt  the  true  solution  of  the  problem  which  now  so  troubles  the  world. 
For  this  purpose  and  in  the  interest  of  what  is  believed  to  be  truth,  hu- 
manity, and  justice,  was  this  written  by  the  author  who  will  now  leave 
these  pages  after  having  with  sincere  good  will  thanked  the  readey 
whose  patience  has  endured  to  the  end, 

Caldwell,  Canyon  County,  Idaho,  GEORGE  REED. 

May  1st,  1893. 


V^  OP  THB  ^:^ 


?5;V 


YC   I4%6 


,^-r-:-, 


